The Captain and the Spy
by LizzyGal86
Summary: Post Avengers / Pre & During Winter Soldier. Natasha and Steve's story from the start of it all. Told from Natasha's POV.
1. Chapter 1

I could still remember the very first time I saw him.

It was in passing at the gym, in the halls and cafeteria. I'd heard of him long before I'd set eyes on him and even then, I'd expected something else.

For all the hype I'd expected a bit more.

I was never really around long enough to put my finger on what that more was when he'd woken up from the ice. Shield kept me busy. They made sure I was gone more than I was anywhere else. Normally that was great. It kept me busy. It helped me make things right. It helped me not think, not remember. If I stayed busy I didn't have to think about the past.

Then I met Steve.

It wasn't exactly a name you'd picture belonging to a super soldier.

Yet, it worked. It would pop up in my head at the weirdest most inopportune times and the more I saw him, spoke with him, was around him it became more present. It'd been seventeen days since the Battle of New York and it bounced around my head like a ping pong ball.

Tomorrow I had to go to France for work so I'd given up.

Between the briefings, meetings, briefings, strategy meetings, appointments and more meetings we hadn't had any time alone. Every elevator seemed to be full of people. The gym was never empty and we weren't stupid. He was watched all the time. I had quite the impressive list of enemies. If I wanted to have something that was just mine I would have to wrap it up safely, put it in a special place and hide it.

I wasn't in love.

I doubted I was capable of that particular emotion.

But there was something more when we were alone in the gym together, or when the cafeteria was empty at two in the morning. When we could talk to one another without people milling around looking at us like something to be put behind a locked door and observed.

When I heard the lock turn in my small dark apartment, I sat up straight as if I'd been shot. It woke me from a dead sleep. That noise sent me barreling out of bed before I could think twice. I didn't turn a light on as I tripped hurrying out of my bedroom, heart pounding in anticipation.

I knew it was him.

A little atomic clock that shone numbers on my ceiling told me it was very close to three in the morning. I didn't care what time it was, it could have been any hour of the day.

Another lock slid, echoing loud as a gunshot.

I tripped over a pair of shoes and swore loudly when my shin hit a piece of furniture.

Oh that hurt!

Bright stars erupted into my vision as pain fire-worked in my lower leg. Profanities were many as I stumbled over to the door of my apartment. With a few swipes I got the four chains off as the last deadbolt slid out.

When I yanked the door open Steve slid in and I peered down the hall to see if anyone appeared, if any doors opened or otherwise.

"I circled your block a few times and took the stairs up here. I didn't see anyone out there," came his voice inside my apartment. "I tried to come before tonight but I'm being followed. I don't know by who though. I think by someone at Shield."

Everything seemed to be clear so I shut the door and started to flip locks.

I turned and threw my arms around him, squeezing him tightly as I wished I could have days ago. My arms wrapped around his waist. I buried my face in his coat just to take in the feeling of him being alive. When his arms wrapped around me I closed my eyes.

We'd talked since New York.

We'd gone to most all of the same meetings and briefings and appointments. We rode back on the same plane. We'd grabbed food at the cafeteria and went to the gym. But it was different when you knew that people were watching, observing, enemies could be anywhere. It was hard to be your true self when most people knew you as your codename.

"Will you be in France long," he breathed against the top of my head eventually.

I didn't want to let him go.

I didn't want to give up that unconditional comfort that expected nothing in return.

But I did, I had to let go of him. So I plastered on a tired smile, loosened my grip and glanced up at him after I reached over to turn the lights on in my small but modern apartment. It had come fully furnished and my only contribution had been a few things in the fridge and closet. I could leave it behind at a moment's notice.

"A week or two. I'm not sure. You want some coffee? A beer? A bottle of water?"

He told me he was fine and a little bit of disappointment hit at the thought he'd leave as soon as he came, when he unzipped and shed his coat that pesky feeling evaporated. I could go for a bottle of water myself and headed that way. Into the open space that was the kitchen, dining area and living room with a view of the capitol that was my most recent domicile.

He was already sitting down in a chair that looked impossibly small for his frame when I was done.

"You doing ok? Any more nightmares?"

I grabbed a box of crackers from the counter that I'd noticed he'd liked as I made my way to my spartan dining room table. Not that I was neat or anything. I just didn't have much of anything in my life outside of my work. My apartment was just a place for me to sleep and do laundry.

He caught the box from the air when I tossed it, reflexes clearly on pointe.

In response to his question I made a face, "Eh…they've calmed down over the past few days. I think staying away from the TV and twenty-four hour news cycle has helped. Are you sleeping?"

It did not escape my notice that he immediately opened the box and grabbed a few crackers. "Same…that Shield doctor wants to send me to a counselor to make sure I am ready to go back in the field."

I made a face and he nodded in agreement.

"Just make something up. I told him I was dreaming about flying on a unicorn over a fully fixed up New York City. Get creative. I swear…if that guy knew what I really dreamed about he'd run out of his office screaming."

A look of complete understanding crossed his face as he again nodded. "Like flying alien centipedes flying through a major metropolitan area, killing people, ripping it apart like a school diorama?"

"Yeah leave them out when you go see him," was my suggestion. I gave him a smile that I hoped was supportive and reached across the table to put my hand on his. He didn't pull his hand away or act embarrassed. Instead he put the box of crackers down and covered my hand with his. I wasn't good with this kind of stuff. It wasn't exactly taught to girls training to be assassins. Since he was from another time entirely I felt comfortable in the knowledge that it would be new territory for him too.

"Fury offered me a position in shield."

I perked right up at that piece of information.

His hand stayed on mine and gave it a squeeze, "I took it. I'll start training this week."

If that didn't give me a weird feeling of something fluttery and unfamiliar. Seeing more of him would be a good thing I lied to myself. Having him as a friend I saw more often was what I wanted, I continued to lie to myself. I may not have been current on the intricacies of friendships, but I knew friends didn't hide their friendship when out in public. Friends didn't pretend they were just colleagues and sneak off to see one another, they didn't hide the extent of their friendship from the people around them.

And yet, I couldn't help but feel like a little child who'd found something precious and hid it so it wasn't taken away and destroyed, or used against me.

Steve cupped my hand between both of his and brought it to his mouth. He closed his eyes for a moment then gave my hand another squeeze. "I'm glad you're here. I've missed you."

"I missed you too."

His breath was warm against my fingers and then he let my hand go back to the table, but I entwined our fingers to keep that touch, that contact.

"It was weird pretending to not know you," he confessed. "But it's kind of nice to just be Steve."

He had no idea.

"I can't believe you actually called me ma'am." Then, for no other reason than I was curious, I asked, "What'd you think of Bruce?"

His eyebrows met as he considered my question.

So as not to be too weird I was about to ask his impressions of Tony and Thor, but he spoke up almost uncomfortably.

"I've never seen anyone quite like him. Back when…before I went in the ice…I never pictured a scientist surviving that catastrophic of an accident, or turning into a big green rage monster. It takes a minute to get used to, that's for sure." Then he tilted his head and as if taking a peek into my mind he asked, "He's the guy Fury has you following and keeping tabs on? To be sure he doesn't…go off into space like Thor?"

Quietly I nodded, Steve was the only person I had ever confided in and that was one of the things I shared. I'd never had any issue following someone around before in my years working for Shield. But there was something off-putting about following Bruce around the globe. He hadn't asked for what happened to him, he never wanted to become Hulk.

"He's spending time with Tony in New York? Right? That should give you some breathing room."

A breath came out a little quicker than I'd expected but I agreed. "Yeah, they're bro-ing it up now so that'll give me some time."

His eyebrows rose in a silent question.

"Guy time," I explained, then pulled my hand free so I could open my bottle of water. "You sure you don't want something to drink?"

He shook his head then glanced out at the vast bounty of my apartment. Something on the tip of his tongue. When he eventually looked back at me I was ready for his question.

"Would you mind if I slept on your couch?"

It was not the first time he asked.

Because he was that old soul he quickly added, "If not I completely understand. It's late. You probably have an early morning."

I gave him my most disapproving look, "Steve you're being ridiculous. You know where the hall closet is. Grab a pillow and blankets." Upon seeing that hint of relief and knowing how he felt about staying at the Shield dorms, I continued as casually as possible. "You know you're free to stay here while I'm gone. If anyone asks just say you're house sitting for me."

He sort of sagged into that poor chair.

Something spurred him to look back my way and ask, "Wait…what's wrong with ma'am?"


	2. Chapter 2

Two months later…

"I've figured it out Romanov," came from behind and before I could think straight pure sass came out of my mouth.

"It wouldn't happen to be the mystery of who keeps eating my food out of the breakroom fridge? Would it?"

Meal prepping was hard enough as it was without our resident office-place food thief.

Of all the places Shield had cameras it seemed the budget did not extend to the break room. I was so blowing up that anonymous suggestion box on the way out of the office.

"No…but we can add it to the list," was Steve's immediate chipper response as he pulled out one of the conference chairs beside me and plopped down. My gaze traveled to the other side of the room where Shield's very own Counter-Terrorism Strike Team stood at the board in what could only be described as a huddle.

One could have called my gaze icy.

The brick of a man, Brock Rumlow, tall dark and broody, glanced up and not for the first time that day told me, "It wasn't us. We've been downstairs all morning."

I made sure that my expression conveyed that I was not totally convinced by his official statement. When I turned my attention back to Steve that twist went on in my gut and to be sure there were absolutely no hints of anything reasonably close to secret looks, I further complained, "I had to eat a MRE for breakfast."

He frowned at me as only he could, "You were the one who went through my locker this morning?"

Not a hint of remorse went through my body. Nor did I doubt he knew it was me in there as I'd left him a highly inappropriate message inside his locker door in sharpie. "Yeah and you need to get better snacks. Something peanut butter flavored and crunchy. Put that on your list."

If there was any hint of personal offense or righteous outrage from said message he didn't let on.

As a few more people moseyed on into the office space that could have been any office in America, I crossed my legs and glanced his way. "What did you figure out Rogers?"

A few of the men in suits greeted Steve openly, giving me more subdued greetings that I nodded at in response.

When he was done being the paragon of virtue he turned those baby blues on me and almost haughtily informed me, "That smell in my apartment building."

My eyebrows rose in considerable interest.

"The old bingo loving lady downstairs didn't have fourteen cats. So you owe me twenty big one's."

This got my interest. Along with the Shield Suits who weren't even pretending not to listen to our conversation as they unpacked their briefcases.

"She had a meth lab in her apartment…"

My shock could not be hidden. Nor could the Suit's shock. Mouths gaped and eyes went wide all around.

"…she was enlisting her Bingo cohorts to sell her product. It was how they financed their luxury cruise to Alaska last month. The police evacuated our building. There was even a shoot out. Then the fire department had to secure her apartment and we couldn't go back into our apartments till they finished. My neighbors son put it on the YouTube if you want to watch."

My goodness, his elderly neighbor sounded better with every passing second. I couldn't find entertainment like that on the TV. Of course I'd be watching it. "That little fire loving psycho's YouTube page?"

Steve nodded and I stored that piece of information away for later when I was home in bed with my laptop.

"Do you care if I come along with you later this afternoon? I passed Clint on the way here. He mentioned getting called out and you'd be down a man."

Which was code.

The aforementioned Paragon was lying and I could not help but be incredibly entertained.

While Clint indeed did get called out for an emergency assignment down in Mexico City, he had not been joining me on my surveillance. In fact he'd been taking every opportunity to tease me about it that he could, ever since I pulled the short straw earlier that week.

Maybe Clint was stealing my food too? A quick mental run-through told me no. He'd eat half of it then put my container back in the fridge.

The look I sent Steve was a questioning one since he knew how bored I'd been all week.

One of the suits helpfully chimed in, "Oh Captain, that news crew is coming to see you this afternoon. Remember?"

Ah, mystery solved.

Which was my cue if that look on his usually stoic face was any clue. "If you can come it'd be helpful. But if not its ok. I can have Fury send up someone to help me out instead."

There, I did my part to not act too excited.

It wasn't too much longer before the meeting started and went on and on and on for seemingly ever.

In actuality it was only an hour and a half, but that was an hour too long in my humble opinion.

We were no closer to finding out about the rumored Vibranium that was supposedly making its rounds through the black market. Personally, I'd heard better substantiated accounts of Bigfoot. But I kept that to myself.

Since I had nothing new to add I sat back and watched the suits go over all the previous information we covered in the last meeting. They brought up the new gossip because that's what it was and then the Strike Team made guesses for fifteen minutes on where it could maybe be.

I could have been checking my emails.

When the meeting broke with plans to meet in a week I couldn't get out of there fast enough and not because breakfast was giving me indigestion.

Since I'd brought nothing with me it didn't take me long to get out and into the hallway. A plan had been formulating in my head concerning my surveillance. During the meeting my mind had time to wander. I was still pondering when I noticed the full elevator getting fuller, thus helping me make the executive decision to take the stairs.

The arsenal was downstairs in the fortified basement and I had plans.

Most of those plans involved hitting up the tech guys to see if they had anything I would find useful. In the past they never let me down so hopes were high.

Having no plans to wait up to see whether or not Steve would be coming along, I all but skipped down the stairs.

It took me a few moments to realize he was calling after me by the time I was two stairwells down.

"Natasha! Nat!"

I came to a stop and looked up, the planning going on in my head coming to a stop.

Not surprisingly he came down the stairs at a quick pace.

His eyes narrowed in on me, "You're up to something. I know what a bad idea looks like on your face."

While the stairwell wasn't very noisy, I still peered over the edge to look down for a better look and listen.

"I want in on your bad idea."

This led me to look back at him, "It's not an idea yet. It's forming into a bad idea. Baby stages of bad. I'll let you know what shapes up."

"Nat," came out of him saying more than a dozen words ever could.

I gestured at the star at his chest.

He frowned, impatient with where I was going with this, and I went there, "Your adoring public awaits. Angela Codie is coming to do the interview right? You'll get a prime spot on the six o'clock news for the DC metro area. We wouldn't want you to let Angie down."

Full on tease, I wasn't going to lie. It was light teasing but still, I could not help myself. In my defense Tony had started it so I couldn't be blamed.

"Getting pawed at like some kind of an animal is not my idea of a good time. When are you leaving?"

Sounds from below of a door opening and someone going downstairs echoed up to us.

My eyes went upward in thought. "Half an hour or so. Long enough for me to pick up a few things and get to the garage."

"Don't leave without me."

"Don't miss the bus," I clapped right back. He frowned in confusion. Before he could say anything I amended my statement, "The theoretical bus Roger's. Don't make me wait."


	3. Chapter 3

"What about that cute lady who runs the Korean lunch truck by Shield Headquarters? She's gorgeous and we know she can cook. If you dated her then we'd be set up for life. I wouldn't have to worry about meal prep ever again." I'm not going to lie. It was a fantasy I had nurtured for the past few minutes. "Lets be a team player here Steve."

Since we were both spread out on the ground and covered with a camouflage blanket used mostly by snipers, I couldn't be moving a whole lot. But we could talk. From where I'd led him through the woods of northern Virginia to the old long ago abandoned glass factory on the edge of the small town, we'd found high ground and made ourselves somewhat comfortable.

It was hot, sticky and uncomfortable.

There was absolutely nothing going on down outside the factory, yet people came and went through several heavily armed guards. Paired with the weird readings the monitor was giving us, even Steve was suspicious as hell.

I'd long ago sweated through my clothes and could only imagine his suit must have been a bit damp on the inside.

Binoculars never left his eyes, "First off…I don't know if I like Korean food."

I was almost positive that he could have run around the entire perimeter and got a better look at the factory thanks to that serum running through his veins. Somehow he seemed fine with digging in and watching from my latest spot.

"Who doesn't like Korean food," came out of me before I could think twice.

Not that he listened to me.

"And second of all…" the binoculars stayed up even though I was pretty sure he didn't need them having all but memorized his Shield file. "What is everyone's fascination with setting me up on dates? What about you? Are you dating anyone?"

I snorted so hard my binoculars hit me in the face.

At that Steve actually did lower his binoculars so he could turn his head and look my way.

"I don't date."

He continued to stare at me, "At all?"

"Nope."

From the forest floor he managed to tilt his head in question and I felt the need to elaborate for some weird reason.

"It just…complicates things. Some of my work needs me to blur lines in that area of my life. It's just easier for me to be alone and not hurt anyone."

He understood what I told him. I could tell by his face. But there seemed to be a bit of him that wasn't able to stop peeling the onion. "Have you ever dated anyone?"

My past life hadn't been conducent with that sort of activity.

All of my experience in that particular box had been for work and after a while, it sort of held a bad taste in my mouth. Whenever the need for companionship arose it wasn't hard to go find an obliging soul.

It sounded so sad when I answered him with a simple, "No." So it didn't sound so weak I continued on for good measure. I mean really, he'd grown up during a world war and been turned into a super soldier. It wasn't a shock why he wasn't burning his way through Tinder. I was just damaged goods. "People like me don't date or have those types of things."

My gaze went back to the building in the hopes he would take the hint.

Unfortunately, it seemed my good natured teasing had not won me any goodwill in this situation because he then asked. "Wanting is an entirely different matter than blind acceptance? Other than the occasional soul you find at a college bar?"

Again I smacked my head on my binoculars.

Give the guy credit, he kept a straight face when he told me. "One came by your apartment when you were gone. I told him I was house sitting but I don't think he believed me."

For the love of all that was holy.

I brought one guy home on a spur of the moment New Years Eve. That was the last time I found company on a major holiday without making plans in advance. If I wanted to see any of them again, I would have given then my real name and number.

Steve was apparently done making me wonder if I made a huge mistake in letting him come with me. He was on the threshold of getting poisoned. Nothing dangerous, just something to make him uncomfortable.

"What's in the bag? Anything we could find particularly useful?"

Ah yes, my bag.

I'd refused to let him carry it since I told Kirwan that I wouldn't let it out of my sight.

Grateful for that reprieve and reconsidering his future poisoning, I scooted myself down enough under the camouflage covering where it was both hot and uncomfortable. But I grabbed a handful of canvas and scooted back up enough to just barely expose my face. From inside the hard sided camera bag, I procured a device that kind of looked like a small camcorder but with a bigger panel that flipped open.

Needless to say he scooted closer until our sides touched and his cheek rested against my arm.

"It's still being developed. But the guys down in the lab are letting me do a trial run. It's supposed to pick up traces of metals, chemicals and whatnot from a safe distance."

He wasn't stupid.

Clearly the same lightbulb that went off over my head earlier dinged over his.

"Like Vibranium."

Following Kirwan's instructions step by step, I turned the equipment on and watched as the little screen on the panel turned on. "That's one of the things this should detect."

As curious as I was, he quietly watched me turn it on and we both waited while everything came into focus.

When I pointed it at the seemingly abandoned glass factory we stared at the screen.

A black and grey outline of the building came up that was pretty distinguishable. Upon pointing it down something in a soft blue appeared but it was faint.

I frowned.

"That's a glass factory right?"

I'm not going to lie, I was more focused on adjusted the buttons on the equipment than him, "Yeah."

"The ovens are usually insulated and surrounded by thick walls? Right?"

I had no clue.

The expression on my face must have conveyed that fact.

He gestured with a hand so much bigger than mine, "Let me see it."

Immediately I heard Kirwan pleading with me to be gentle with it and bring this one back in one piece, unlike all the other things I borrowed and checked out.

"Do you promise to be gentle with it?"

His expression was incredulous, "Are you serious Natasha?"

He didn't understand.

"I promised not to break this one and to be on my absolute best behavior when handling it. So you have to be careful…like really careful, this is the only one and it's still in development."

His hand remained out, "Natasha."

He sounded so serious I couldn't help but smile, "Yes Sir." This earned me a surprised look that became an amused one that I built on. "You're the commissioned military officer. If you break it you'll be able to cover it with all that backpay from when you were asleep."

Finally I plopped it in his hand which very carefully wrapped around it and cuddled like an egg. A quick inspection of it came from all angles, "How much does it cost?"

Only the truth came from my lips.

"It's a prototype so there's no telling."

Oh so carefully he turned it over and pressed buttons, twisted a dial and aimed it around to get a baseline for other spots around us. When he eventually returned it to the factory that dull blue returned. "Something is definitely in there…have you been keeping notes on their movements?"

Half a notebooks worth with sketches. Which was about what I was going to share when something began to vibrate on my leg. Steve glanced in that direction as I reached down between us to grab my silent phone.

He flinched a second later as his went off too.


	4. Chapter 4

Almost a week later in Chicago…

Deep down I knew that something like this could possibly happen, eventually happen.

What with the world of espionage and international intrigue being so small.

Plus there was always the chance of various Shield operations crossing paths.

Still, I'd never run into any of my fellow agents in the field before that moment in time.

Earlier that day was my official first.

It was never something I sat around actively thinking about in the same way I wondered why nothing nefarious ever seemed to happen in Tahiti, or the Virgin Islands.

The thought briefly crossed my mind when I got back to Shield still cleaning green and brown paint from my face. I, nay we, found out that we were both going to Chicago with a few members of the Strike Team.

After which we went to different briefings when my path with Steve forked.

Not too unusual, I had three separate things going on in the greater Chicago area. Not another thought was given and I focused on a terrorist named Baker whom I'd been working on for the better part of two years. I'd given a tip to Shield that he was close to getting his hands on a catastrophic weapon and next thing I knew I was back in place as a member of his terrorist cell.

On that particular morning I'd been out with a few of the members when the oddest feeling of being watched came to my attention.

We were out in the busy city so the other cell members weren't too concerned.

I'd made my role in their group as a non-trusting sort that came and went, so my paranoia was brushed off. They considered me flighty, paranoid but well connected enough to get them things that they needed. So that worked out fabulously for my need to come and go.

But I couldn't quite shake the feeling of being watched.

I'd look around to see if I saw anyone or anything familiar.

Nothing ever stuck out.

Not until I got a flash of a blue baseball cap. There was just something about it that clicked. One could say that proverbial lightbulb went off.

Somehow I just knew it was Steve.

Something just stuck.

Which actually worked out perfectly because I'd assumed I was riding solo and things were on the train to Problem-Town. I had so much information to pass on. Said information had been passed on to Shield as per my usual. But I'd not heard back from them at all and Problem-Town was on fire.

For the rest of the day I did my best to subtly drop clues around Chicago while out with the members of the group. If it wasn't Steve, or even perhaps someone on the Strike Team I didn't want to give anything away. If I was correct, my fingers were crossed that the signals weren't too vague.

I also hoped that if all those stars lined up that I wasn't too late.

It was well after one in the morning when I managed to leave the incredibly sketchy motel I'd been crashing in.

After that it took me close to an hour to travel eleven miles. I took four different trains and one taxi in between. Even then I hunkered onto a fire escape for a while to be sure no one had followed me.

In the time all of that took I could have walked the city.

Eventually I made my way through a chain-link fence that encircled an long ago abandoned restaurant covered with graffiti. The building had so much of it that the lack of lighting on the street made no difference. Was there such a thing as glow in the dark spray paint?

If it was even possible, every window was broken out.

One of the windows with the least amount of glass was my entrance point considering the doors were all chained shut.

I wasn't trying to leave a mess behind me.

Broken glass crunched beneath my boots on the other side of that window.

It was just as dark inside as it was outside. The interior looked massive in the darkness to my eyes which didn't even need to adjust.

Lucky me, a small reddish light flicked on to my left.  
"Oh good it's you…you made it. Sorry I'm late. I wanted to be sure no one followed me."

That small red light illuminated just enough to let me find my way around the dark dining area. Through a maze of tables and chairs all over the place in both good and bad condition. The light was red so as not to totally mess up our night vision.

"I assumed. It's fine," came from the chair Steve was seated in.

On my journey over there I immediately told him how bad things were in case he didn't know.

"Baker has the weapon. He's going to use it tomorrow."

Right before I made it over I swore a big cat sized rat ran past my boots.

Possibly the most horrible thing I saw that night. And I had three pages of notes and detailed sketches of horribleness for Rogers. Which I pulled from my pants and put in his hand. "They're going to release it in Willis Tower in the morning. Everything is in there that you need to know."

There was not a second of hesitation. He slid it into his jacket while asking, "What are you going to be doing? Do you want to keep your cover intact?"

Could he be anymore perfect?

It just wasn't fair.

Why couldn't I be that good?

In the red glow I was able to see a few chairs nearby. I pondered sitting but decided against it. "If possible. Baker has a large cell that stretches outside of Chicago. I don't know how realistic that is though with this weapon." As for my plan, well, it was a simple one. "I'm going to sabotage everything I can for as long as I can while you and the team get the weapon and Baker…I'm not going to make the first extraction point. I'll do the second one." I wanted to stay with as many of the cell members as long as possible to see where they went and gather any sort of intelligence left behind.

When he spoke me it didn't sound like he was questioning me. More like he was double checking, he sounded in full support of my plan. "You're sure?"

"Positive," was my answer. "It'll be fine. Fun even."

Even in the dark I could see his expression change ever so slightly.

Now I couldn't be absolutely sure but maybe there was a flicker of amusement for a second or two. Then he stood up easily towering over me in height and width. Not in an intimidating sort of way, never from him. From other men I'd known yes but never Steve.

"I'll keep my eye out for you tomorrow."

"After getting the weapon," I corrected.

To which he had a comeback even I had to admire, "I can do two things at once."

There was no other response than to agree. "That's why you're the Captain."


	5. Chapter 5

It was not fine, nor fun or even anywhere near ok.

Although to sum it all up, it was a success.

My cover with the terrorist cell was still intact. Steve had apprehended the terrorist Baker before he could murder thousands of people in the name of his cause. A huge plus in my book. Half of Baker's Chicago cell were gone, or had moved on to a higher plane of existence or wherever you went when you were arrested. Most unfortunately, Shield was in possession of the weapon.

It was glowing inside of the backpack I stole after I got thrown out of the Willis Tower.

Trust me, I wasn't happy about it either.

Unlike Steve or Thor or Banner, there was nothing extra running through my veins. So when I went through the window with Baker's fleeing cell members and bounced off a city bus, I really felt it. There was something magical happening in my shoulder. I was bleeding everywhere from the glass. Granted it was only three stories and I was not the lucky one first through the window, or on the bus. So that was another huge plus. Unfortunately I had intercepted the glowing Hello Kitty lunchbox containing something special, Which meant I had to hoof it to put distance between the lunchbox and Baker's followers.

In getting away from Baker's well-wishers, associates and comrades I'd missed the first extraction time. Which really made kick myself for telling Steve I'd be cool going solo.

I'd never wanted a man around so badly.

I really didn't want the glowing humming weapon close to me and his Super Soldier Serum probably would hold up better than my standard issue blood.

This led me to rethink a considerable amount of my life choices while hobbling through the back streets of the city. In the hope to not draw attention in my condition. It was a bit much even for me.

Plus with the amount of police presence around and riding out solo till tomorrow, I didn't want anyone knowing what I had shoved in the backpack. With my luck they'd send me to the hospital and somehow I doubted they'd let anything glowing in with me.

This was what led me to the Shield Safehouse located in Chicago's largest Russian Orthodox Church.

The irony was not lost on me either.

The priest was a former Shield member who at the sight of me and the backpack of glory seemed to also reconsider many of his life choices.

Oddly, I found myself somewhat fondly remembering my childhood training in pain tolerance.

They taught us how to deal with incredible amounts of pain and I suspected that was why I was still upright considering my shoulder was no longer in its socket. The back of my wrist throbbed enthusiastically from where I had been gouged. It must have begun to clot because the bleeding was down to a steady trickle.

"Why is your backpack glowing," was the older bearded man's first question upon seeing me standing in his office doorway, bleeding all over his incredibly polished floor.

Now I may have been a quart low but I still had my wits about me. Thanks to that aforementioned training that had been so horrific at the time.

"That's not important…do you have any super glue and a place for me to hide till I can get in touch with Shield?"

Fortunately my authority bent him to my will. Or maybe it was the glowing? Or possibly all my blood?

Why was not important.

What was important was he held up his side of the deal with Shield. He took me down the hall into the back of his onion spired, incense smelling church that hit all the old feels at an expedited pace. Almost as if he understood the seriousness of the situation, or maybe he didn't want me bleeding all over.

He all but shoved me in a room directly behind the alter that seemed to be a preparation place with robes and religious garments hanging on the walls. Shelves and bookcases held religious items for the service and decoration. There were also song books, a sink, a rack of wine on the floor and refrigerator. After promising to be right back he vanished. Leaving me pretty sure he was going to call Director Fury himself.

I dropped the backpack on the counter by the sink and grabbed a handful of paper towels from the wall dispenser.

Then I stopped because the main source of where my blood was dripping out of me at a steady drip-drip was on my usable arm.

A string of Russian profanities came from me.

Was it really too much to ask for to have one person try to take over the world from Fiji?

Now I wasn't sure, as I'd never had to pop my shoulder back into its own socket, but I was almost positive that it'd hurt less on a white sandy beach. And it was going to have to go back in because I needed both arms.

That priest was going to be super pissed off when he came back with my super glue.

Because the universe was not done with me yet.

As I pressed my good wrist against the pile of paper towels in an attempt to get some pressure on it, I heard the tell-tale soft noise of a scream being cut off. It was a very distinctive heavy sound of which I was familiar.

More Russian spewed from my mouth.

My eyes scanned the room and eventually came to rest on a large crucifix. Up on a shelf about the size of a family size cereal box.

That would work.

With purpose I strolled over there, grabbed it and headed to the door that was cracked open ready to start Part Two of my morning.

My bloody fingers gripped the heavy bronze crucifix as I slipped into the hallway where I could distinctively make out drops here and there of my blood. My frown could not be contained.

Then came another incredibly distinctive sound as the bearded priest came running past me, beard and robes in the wind. I didn't even get a chance to tell him to go hide. He was already on that exact same page. I didn't even get a chance to see if he had my superglue before that specifically metal sound echoed my way again.

My wet sticky grip on the Crucifixion loosened a smidge.

Very cautiously I peered around the end of the hallway into the front entranceway of the church where I could make out the priests office, tables with local event information and quite a bit of familiar art. Another familiar sight of a body on the floor greeted me. One of Baker's guys from the looks of it.

Even though he wasn't moving I nudged him with my boot.

He definitely wasn't moving.

Further peeking revealed two more guys on the floor. How about that? They were very much unmoving with movement coming from the office that led me to reestablish my grip on the hefty bronze statue.

Not too surprisingly it was Steve. Still in his tactical blue and silver gear, helmet on, shield strapped to his back with a roll of duct tape in hand. For which there was only one response needed from me.

"Are we taking hostages now?"

In an appraising sort of way he looked me over from head to toe. "For your arm."

We were past that level of first aid.

"Check his desk for superglue. We're going to need both."


	6. Chapter 6

"Why is it glowing? Is it supposed to be humming? Is that dangerous?"

I had no good answers for the priest and also shared his alarmed concern.

The poor man was having a horrible day.

There he was, in his office, minding his own business when I showed up and now there were men bound and gagged in his kitchen pantry. A Hello Kitty Lunchbox was glowing ominously at him. He got a full demo of how to clean glass out of a wound then super glue it shut and make a bandage from duct-tape and paper towels. Well, once he came around from fainting after my shoulder was popped back into it's socket.

Which I might add was quite possibly just as horrifically painful as when it was popped out. The pain was excruciating enough to introduce brand new colors to my vision, make my ears ring and a cold sweat break out over my flesh. Had anything been in my stomach it would have come up. But it was the sound that made the priest faint. I'm not going to lie. It was pretty bad. The noise alone made me a bit lightheaded for a few seconds but I powered on through. Sounds always made it worse.

Because he was braver than me, Steve actually took the hot pink plastic lunchbox from the bag and peered inside.

I was not that curious or brave. My life expectancy as a spy was already not promising so I did not want to test fate.

Safely across the room I watched Steve peer in the pink plastic. He sort of tilted his head to the side, shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

"That's not going to blow up in my church? Right? You'd be able to tell right? You're Captain America. You can tell if something isn't safe right?"

A slew of remarks came to mind at the priests questions that I kept to myself. Mostly because I either had no answer or was mildly interested in the answer.

Eventually Steve glanced over his shoulder at me, hair a bit fuzzy from taking his helmet off. "Can you travel today? I can see if we can get an emergency ride out of here since you were able to grab this. Or do you want to wait for tomorrow?"

His sticking around when the Strike Team had left was quite the pleasant surprise.

Granted he had said he had stuck around because he saw me bounce off the bus and thought I was mortally wounded. But it was the thought that counted. None of the other guys had stuck around.

More than willing to pass that lunchbox off to someone of a higher paygrade I gave him a thumbs up. After which I fidgeted with my makeshift sling. It'd fashioned out of an old yellow scarf from the lost and found box in the church office. "I'm good as long as we're not on a motorcycle. The last thing I want is that thing between my legs."

I didn't think it was too unreasonable of a request.

Steve had the audacity to roll his eyes at me. The levels of nineteen forties sass coming off that man was shocking.

Our Shield safehouse representative on the other hand was one hundred percent reasonable. "You need my car? You can have it, keep it. I'll wait till tomorrow to report it stolen. Just do me a favor and destroy it."

He was so going on my Christmas Card list the second I started doing them.

Once Steve snapped the pink box shut and put it back in the backpack, the priest visibly relaxed. When he asked if he could use the phone, the priest procured an iPhone from within his robe.

Quite possible making him most helpful safehouse host in my history with Shield.

"I'll go check the church again," I told the both of them, my second remark was solely for Rogers. "Maybe you should cover that thing with your shield."

My new best friend the priest agreed, "What? Yes! Yes, you should cover that thing with your shield."

The look he sent us was pure snappy disbelief and not just because the priest put his phone on the floor and kicked it over to him to stay away from the backpack.

"You two do realize that it is not radioactive?"

Having had enough of his sass, I put up my good hand that wasn't on fire from the discomfort and walked past him with my new bestie hot on my heels. We both gave him a wide berth. Yet I did mutter quietly beneath my lips unsure if he'd hear me or not. "Put it between your super solider legs then Cap…"

From the look he sent my way he did hear. He did however set his shield down on top of it while pointedly holding my gaze on my way out of the room.

Without the hefty bronze representation of the crucifix in hand, I made my way through the rather sizable orthodox church. It was all ground floor with no access up into those lovely distinctive onion spirals.

I looked everywhere, out every window, even under the alter and in the crawl spaces and back garden. When I peeked in the kitchen pantry at the prisoners they were safely contained and blindfolded.

On my second walk through everything was still quiet.

Well, I mean minus a young couple that the priest took into his office after minimal encouraging from me.

Since the sacristy had no windows and just one door, I wasn't too surprised to see Steve loitering in the hallway that led directly to it.

"Everything is clear for now," was my report. "A young couple came in so the priest took them in his office. Your not hostages are still confined to the pantry."

"We're not ransoming them so they're prisoners," he instantly corrected.

To which I furthered, "I can't go back with them and risk my cover with Baker or his cell." Even blindfolded there was the chance they'd hear my voice.

When he crossed his arms it made him look so much bigger.

"I told that to the extraction team. They're sending two cars and we'll go back separately. How does your arm feel."

"Tingly," was my response. I even wiggled my fingers from within the makeshift scarf as proof.

He never asked if it hurt for which I was eternally grateful. Whether it was a holdback from the old days, or he just had common sense. When he did speak it was to ask an entirely different question.

"What are you doing tonight?"

My mouth opened in an amused sort of way, "Tell me you're not trying to get out of your date with Amber's daughter from Harvard?"

With a straight face he told me, "She's having issues with her parole officer and cannot make it."

I managed to stop my laugh but not the snort that came out.

"Assuming you don't get sent to the hospital when we get back. I was thinking of trying Thai food tonight."

Thai food sounded like one heck of a good time to me.

But I couldn't help myself from a taunt, "And I'm your last resort?"

He gave me a humored sort of smile.

He sort of glanced down at his boots for a second, "If I had a choice, you'd be the first. No one's asked me what I want to do on my weekend. It's only my private life after all."

Well that was the God's honest truth.

If that didn't hit me somewhere low I don't know what would. There was only one thing that I could ask in response to that, "What does Captain America want to do on his weekend off with his private time?"

Clearly he'd been think about this because he told me. "I want to go to a baseball game. I want to eat bad food at the game with you and most likely explain baseball, listen to you complain about how boring it is and make snarky little remarks."

He wasn't wrong, I was more of a hockey gal myself. But I was willing to sit through a baseball game and make snarky remarks for him.

"Let's go to a baseball game. I'll get tickets. You can buy the stadium food."


	7. Chapter 7

"Jeez…why's it glowing? Keep that away from me. Take that downstairs before it leaks and we're all quarantined this weekend."

I couldn't hide my grin.

Using my right arm I hugged Clint tightly, getting a nice big whiff of his spicy cologne and that feeling of comfort from a true unconditional friend. As the oldest friend from my start over, Clint had met us out on the roof when our jet landed. He'd walked us in and had been in a pretty good mood till he saw the backpack in Steve's hand.

"I am taking it downstairs," Steve told him.

I chimed in with, "Cap says it's not radioactive."

"I don't care what it is. It's glowing and I may one day want to have a family."

Which was kind of true.

Clint's wife was pregnant with their second child and I was over the moon. He was keeping it quiet which I had mad respect for. So I maintained my unaffected office face as Steve sighed deeply then looked up at the electronic elevator numbers as we waited.

"What are you up to this weekend?"

In a thoughtful sort of way I pursed my lips, "Taking Steve to a baseball game. Sleeping and hopefully walking this off." A sweeping gesture was made at my whole mess of a self as if he needed to ask. The civilian clothes I had on were dirty and covered with blood. My arm was slung to me with a fleece Bart Simpson scarf and there were paper-towels duct taped to my other wrist. "You?"

Those green eyes of his watched the backpack closely, "Going on a fishing trip."

Code for home to the farm.

"Bring me back fudge," was my immediate response. His wife Laura made the best fudge. "A lot of fudge. Don't cheap out on me again. At least three flavors and one of them better be the salted caramel chocolate."

We all quieted down as a few people walked down the hall.

Only when they were a safe distance away did he ask, "Wait…don't you have a date with so and so's daughter who goes to Harvard Rogers?"

Sighing the eternal sigh of a man who could take no more, Steve rolled his head to look at Clint, "She has to reschedule."

Always a gentleman. I had mad respect for that too. It was me who told Clint, "She's in jail this weekend."

Unlike me, Clint was unable to not laugh.

He laughed and wiped a tear from his eye, earning a look from Steve. Only after that did he lean close to ask, "So I'm thinking of raiding that glass factory. Is there any way you could camp out this weekend one night to see if anything goes on? It was busy last Saturday night. I want to see if that pattern holds."

Sounded reasonable to me.

Being a thorough man he'd want all of the information he could get in order to plan a raid of the place.

"I left something for you in your locker," he added as the doors opened. Then he waited for Steve to go in before following him and standing on the exact opposite side. My smile could barely contain itself.

"Oh how you spoil me."

All three of us called out different floors. Clint was heading to the garage. Steve was heading to the lab. I was heading to Director Fury's floor which earned me a look from both of them.

Only Steve said it, "Really?"

"I'll go see the doctor next," was what I told him. My gaze then went to Clint, "Any luck figuring out what's being hidden in there?"

Clint gave me a look then slid his hands in his pockets.

It was all the answer I needed and my smile grew. "I'll take my bet in the form of a _Not It _on our next assignment."

Lucky for me my floor was the first stop.

I saluted them both on my way off and was close enough to hear Clint ask about the backpack again.

After that the rest of my afternoon went into a blackhole.

I spent nearly an hour in Fury's office before I spent close to three with the Shield doctor. That man had the audacity to say I needed to spend the night in the hospital.

I could hardly believe it either.

I downright refused. I made death threats. I even promised to come back in the morning for a check-up.

Hospitals and me weren't on good terms.

I did allow him to clean up the gash on the back of my wrist that I had first aided like a champ. Then I let him x-ray my shoulder which shockingly had no other damage. I could hardly believe it either. Apparently landing on the terrorist cell member had taken a lot of the impact out of my fall.

Once I got away from that madman I made my way downstairs to my locker where I found a pair of night vision binoculars. Knowing Clint they were far from your typical military grade night vision equipment.

He really did know the way to my black little heart.

After that I made the executive decision to go home.

I was dirty and could actually smell myself. I was hungry and itchy, plus it was starting to get dark out and I wanted to try out the binoculars on my neighbors. So I stuffed them in my new blue medical grade sling and set off to go to my apartment.

Visions of my shower danced through my head while I fought through DC traffic.

Needless to say, by the time I got to my apartment I was done.

Straight into my bathroom I went and turned the shower on as hot as I could get it. Yet it was never hot enough. Ignoring the doctors orders I climbed right in without covering my wrist with a bag to protect the superglue from water. I'd left my clothes on so maybe that counted?

The water went cold before I took off my clothes.

Clearly I hadn't thought it through since my sling got wet.

Eventually everything got clean, I left my pile of dirty wet clothes in the shower and managed to find a pair of sweats and a t-shirt. After that I dropped onto the couch with big plans to burn my clothes from that day in my fireplace.

My head hit the pillows. My eyes closed.

Locks on my front door began to turn.

My eyes opened as I remembered.

Quietly I swore to myself. By the time I sat up and headed to the door Steve had it open and that dread I felt at having someone in the apartment while I felt like I'd been hit by a bus vanished. Oh was I indeed exhausted. On the other hand, seeing a paper bag on his arm full of Thai takeout filled me with magically happy feelings.

He was really was a hero.

"What'd you get?"

He began flipping all my locks, "I went to that place you mentioned and asked for the best things on their menu. So I have no idea."


	8. Chapter 8

Incessant beeping woke me up.

Horrible noises went off pulling me out of the blissful darkness of heavy sleep.

When I reached out my hand didn't hit my bed, or my nightstand. Instead I wound up knocking a something heavy that was in the wrong place onto the floor which was weird. When I opened my eyes I noticed that I was neither in bed, or alone.

I didn't know what day it was, what time it was but I did figure out I was on my couch.

Pillows were stuffed underneath me and so was Steve.

Those long legs of his were stretched out onto my coffee table. The Golden Girls were on my TV. A hand was curled up in my hair with the weight of his arm resting solidly against my back.

A phone in his pocket was the offending chiming item.

Sometime over the night he must have shoved pillows under my head after I'd fallen asleep on his lap. Judging from the slow disoriented way he was moving, he'd obviously slept pretty soundly too.

He blinked, looked around and then shifted his body beneath mine to retrieve his phone.

Having felt like I'd been hit like a bus I was unable to make such wild and crazy movements.

After silencing said alarm he tossed said phone onto the couch and sank back into the cushions.

"What time is it…"

"Five," he grunted back.

Why was I awake at five in the morning on one of the rare Saturdays I had off? A noise of protest came from me. Slowly, carefully, I slithered off him onto the couch where I curled up on my side. Clearly the man was a sadist.

He actually sat up.

Why was he moving? I was banning him from my apartment. This was ridiculous.

"I'm going to go work out."

Why was he talking? There was no reason to be talking.

He stopped talking and I thought he was done, gone.

I could just hang on to that dream.

No sooner had that blissful darkness begun to take me back did he shake my shoulder to wake me up.

I could have killed him.

"Nat…drink this…"

My eyes opened to see a glass of water in one of his hands and two pills in his other hand.

Maybe he wasn't that bad?

A few dirty looks were sent his way as I took the pills and downed them with the full glass of water. After which he stuffed a few pillows underneath me.

"I'll be back in a few hours when I'm done."

Why was he still talking?

Blindly I swatted at him and closed my eyes, bound and determined to get back to sleep. I may have told him to shut up and or go away. Who could remember? I was not a morning person on my days off.

Not that he listened to me.

This man knelt down beside my couch and shook my arm until I opened my eyes and looked at him.

"Do you want to die this morning Rogers?"

He did not seem impressed. "Do you promise to stay here and not go anywhere? I don't want to get back to an empty apartment and you out causing problems without me."

Using the arm that was not snugly tucked into the sling, I grabbed his warm t-shirt and gave him a yank forward. "I am this close to quitting at Shield and going to work for Tony so we never have a repeat of this again. It is Five in the morning. Have you lost your mind? Are you trying to punish me for something? Are you mad that I made you hold the backpack for the flight home?"

"Just be good. Can you be good while I'm gone?"

"No," was my honest answer.

A couple death threats may have been sent his way. Not long after he got up I could have sworn he was laughing. Since I was well on my way back to sleep I couldn't be totally sure.

It was hours before I eventually woke up for the day.

I only knew it because the sun coming in my apartment was shockingly bright. Too bright to ignore. Sometime over the hours I'd slept in, I'd knocked half the pillows off the couch and noticed that they'd come from my bed. A few other things did not escape my notice.

For one, the binoculars Clint left me were gone. That was mildly annoying.

Additionally, my body didn't hurt quite as much as earlier that morning. So maybe I'd forgive Steve over the binocular theft.

In conclusion, the realization that I'd slept curled up with another human being was most surprising.

It was not something I did or was comfortable with, it exposed a vulnerability in me that I worked hard to ignore. On the other hand it had felt nice. It made me feel good. It rose concerning questions in my life that had never been an issue in the past. Questions such as expectations and what it was that he wanted from me.

Being close to people was a risk because nothing was free, people always wanted something in return. My mind worked a mile a minute wondering if I had made a mistake.

I already had a friend. I had Clint. There was no reason for me to be greedy.

And there they were, every last one of those old demons popping up from where they'd been hidden, bidding their time to come back and haunt me.

Because my Saturday was going so great already, sounds of the locks on my apartment door turning was not a shock.

My free hand came down over my eyes.

I had to find Steve a nice normal woman.

One by one I counted my locks as they turned till eventually the door opened, closed, and more locks were flipped. When his voice filled the living room there was genuine surprise in it.

"Wow…you were sleeping. Still."

My hand came down and my eyes narrowed. Upon propping myself up on my elbow I got a good look at him, seeing that he was freshly showered, shaven and looked as if he'd completed one of those Spartan Runs. A grunt came out of me. "Captain America really needs a girlfriend."

This apparently was not pleasing to him.

Clearly it was neither too early in the day or late in the morning for some of that vintage sass.

"And what about Steve Rogers?"

It was not the response I expected.

But I was way too irritated to back down, "Steve Rogers is going to get a casket if he wakes me up before the sun rises on my day off again."

This made him laugh for some reason.

Maybe he was dehydrated?

But his laughter made me smile and sink back onto my pillows. It was real laughter.

When he came closer I saw he had a paper bag in his hand.

"How'd they work?"

"Shockingly well…" he answered after coming in my apartment and putting down the paper bag on the coffee table. "They have a day time setting. So that should add a whole new degree of entertainment to the game this afternoon."


	9. Chapter 9

**Close to three weeks later…**

For the first time in quite possibly my entire adult life, I was excited to get back to Shield early after a mission ended.

It was only two days early but that didn't matter. Almost gleefully I finished everything I needed to do, visited the new masseur upstairs and then swung by Steve's apartment when I left the office. His motorcycle wasn't there which deflated the optimism balloon that had swelled up inside of me. That was a big surprise. So I told myself that I was excited to get back early so I could visit the seven foot Tahitian with the hands of the Gods.

I wasn't excited to get back and spend time with Steve. I was not that attached to him.

He didn't mean that much to me, or hold that much influence over my emotions.

By the time I got back to my apartment I'd almost completely convinced myself that Armando was the reason I'd was in such a good mood.

Steve had nothing to do with it.

I almost believed it and would have too, if I hadn't got into my apartment to see him in there on my couch surrounded by papers, maps and typing on a laptop.

That whole pep-talk about me not needing anyone but myself died.

Poof.

It was gone.

"Well hey soldier…fancy seeing you here," was what came out of my mouth before I could stop myself. I had my own laptop with after action reports to write so I could feel his proverbial pain. It was etched on his face when he looked up at me. A smile then came over his face and I was done. There wasn't enough brainwashing in the world to not feel a bit worthy on the receiving end of that smile.

"You're back early," was his response, followed by, "Why do you smell like cinnamon?"

My own smile grew.

It was true, I smelled like a stick of the good stuff and when I put all my stuff down on my kitchen counter, I noticed I smeared something oily on my laptop. "I got a massage when I got back with Armando upstairs. You should go. He massaged my deep tissues into submission. Then he sat on my back like Seabuscuit till my spine popped back ten years in time." A bit excited, I turned to him to add the best part. "Plus he has the hot rocks and hot wax. It's like a religious experience."

Steve looked horrified, "He did what to your back?"

Any other man would have been excited at the mention of such bendy activity. Then I wondered if they had masseurs in the forties?

"He rubbed my back really really hard and then stepped on it."

He frowned at me while being horrified, "So why do you smell like cinnamon?"

Why was I excited to see him again?

"That would be the hot oils."

He looked seriously concerned. "You let a strange man rub you with hot oil, pop your spine and put hot rocks on you?"

Even when he put it like that with that look of disbelief, I couldn't even begin to feel a little uncomfortable. My spine felt like a slinky. My head cocked to the side, "Steve? Have you ever had a massage?"

No he had not.

He didn't even need to use his words.

A smile curled over my lips that I could feel in my cheeks before I could think about it. Immediately he pointed a pen at me, "No. No Nat. I don't want to be touched with hot rocks and oils by strangers. And my spine is fine."

"But it could be better."

"No," he repeated again like he had a real choice in the matter.

"It's just like a back rub but better," I encouraged.

Again he gave me that look that told me he hadn't been getting too many backrubs in the good ole days before getting the super soldier serum.

"Nat…I will sit on you for the rest of the night before I let you drag me out of this building to get rubbed with oil."

It was cute how he could sound so serious.

I on the other hand rolled up my sleeves, "We're not going anywhere. Lay down on the floor on your front. I'll even let you keep your clothes on. This is going to be great. Captain America told me Steve Rogers needs a back rub."

He'd only heard one part of that, "You had to take your clothes off to get a massage?"

I snapped my fingers as I approached and pointed to the floor.

His eyes glanced down then back at me.

"Come on. It'll be fun. You trust me right?"

That was what did it. I swore I could see a much younger smaller Steve in his eyes as he looked at the floor, then hesitantly asked, "What exactly are you going to do to my back?"

Clearly the man was uncomfortable and clearly I was hopping around on a boundary line. Still, I couldn't help myself. I was on a mission. For the life of me I could not wrap my head around his never having a massage, or back rub. But then I remembered he didn't always look like he did seated there on my couch. He wasn't used to being touched and it had nothing to do with the time in which he lived. I knew how it felt to be lonely, what it looked like and that chipped away a little at person. This put me on a direct course to back rub central.

"Come on…lay down on your front, fold your arms over your head and put your face between them."

Warily he looked at me as he did what I said.

He was on his knees by my coffee table when he pointed at me in a warning, "No rocks."

"Next time," I promised.

I could have sworn he muttered something under his breath as he situated himself on the floor. I was too happy to care. I all but skipped over to him. When I placed my feet on either side of him, he gave me one last warning look before putting his face down as I requested. Tension in his body was so obvious.

It saddened me to know he was anticipating something painful and was so uncomfortable with being touched. When I straddled the small of his back he was rigid. When my hands lightly touched his back he flinched.

I was on a mission now.

Softly and slowly, I dragged my finger tips up the broad expanse of his back, over the soft warm cotton of his white undershirt. I did that for a while until his body went from painfully rigid to a little stiff. My whole plan being to get him comfortable with my hands. Eventually when I deemed that a success I began to apply a bit of pressure, turning the soft touches to actual contact.

It was slow and steady work that let my hands wander mostly around his shoulder region. Both my eyes and attention was on him for any hint of returning discomfort.

When I began to focus the tight muscles between his shoulders there was almost a full body reaction whether he noticed or not. I could feel him loosen up. Not relax as I'd been like a limp noodle on the table hours ago, but he was no longer clenched up and his hands were no longer fisted. I sank down an inch or so as a result.

Eventually my foot began to tingle as it fell asleep, because why wouldn't it?

This led me to sit up and readjust myself for my comfort. Before I knew it Steve reached around to grab my knee. His blue eyes looked back at me, "Don't stop…it feels really nice."

A little remark about rocks was on the tip of my tongue.

It stayed there.

Instead I gave him a knowing smile, "I told you. Now lay back down, I'm just fixing my foot before it falls asleep."


	10. Chapter 10

**The next week…**

Normally I would have flat out refused.

I was no one's errand-girl. I didn't go and pick people up. I took no soul to the airport. Shield always picked me up.

However, that morning was different.

Shield got a new Corvette for the garage and Steve needed to be picked up.

It was like all the stars lined up in my universe.

Was I a good driver? That was a matter entirely up for debate. But you had best believe I hopped on in after being instructed to go get Steve directly from his morning run around DC.

After I made many promises not to hurt the new car that hadn't even been taken out for a test run, I set off to see how the new Corvette held up to my preferred operating standards.

It held up magnificently.

It was a thing of dreams.

I hardly put a scratch on it.

I drove that thing all over and eventually tracked Steve down, texting him between lights as I looked for a place to pull up by the national monument that was safe. Whether or not it was legal was not too important.

Of course I revved the engine and tested the brakes when pulling up to said curb.

It stopped on a dime.

It was a feat of engineering majesty.

Not far from the curb stood Steve, with whom I could only assume was his running partner. Obviously a military veteran, not a huge guy but he looked like one of those charismatic souls that could always make you laugh.

I hit the window button as both men looked my way.

"Hey Fellas," I greeted, my next words coming freely as the fountain of inspiration flowed. "Either one of you know where the Smithsonian is? I'm here to pick up a fossil."

I found it amusing and so did Steve's friend.

Steve not so much.

I caught a bit of sass on his way to the curb sounding an awful lot like, "That's hilarious."

My eyes however were for his friend who was looking most appreciatively at Shield's newest toy.

"How you doing," he greeted me as Steve climbed in.

Of which there was only one way to answer, "Hey."

Steve dropped in all sweaty from his run. Not that I cared. But I could only imagine how the people in the garage would handle it considering the seats were leather. My eyes stayed on his friend. There was a spark between the two and I wanted a better look, I had a feeling I'd be seeing him again.

Once inside he glanced up to bid his friend a farewell, "Can't run everywhere."

My focus went elsewhere. Moving my mirrors for an break so I could get back into traffic. Of course when I saw an opening I took it and we were off into DC traffic in my new favorite toy.

Not surprisingly, Steve grabbed the door and buckled himself in as quickly as possible.

"He seems nice," I spoke up.

A big hand wrapped around the center console between us. "Nat…just because the car can go seventy miles an hour in three seconds, doesn't mean it should."

I could not contain my smile.

Not even the fossil could spoil my good mood.

A warning light came on that I ignored.

We zoomed along through the city at what I would call an exhilarating rate of speed.

Steve seemed to disagree.

After I may or may not have passed illegally on the right, I wouldn't call it passing. I would have called it getting in the right lane and driving faster than those in the left. Steve vehemently disagreed with me.

I'll forever say he shrieked but he disagreed with that too.

Very strongly he encouraged me to pull over because he wanted to drive.

I felt differently.

By the time I slowed down then stopped for a red light he was issuing demands like a terrorist.

"Pull this car over! I'm serious! Pull it over! I'm driving! You're going to kill us both! This is not a jet! There are laws that you have to follow while driving!"

Dear God he was sounding like Coulson.

Right back at him I shrieked, "We're following the rules! Look…a red light and we're stopped!"

"Get out of your seat! Now! Let me drive!"

The light turned green and I put my hand on his chest to shove him back down before he attempted to remove me from the driver's seat, taking my new favorite toy from me.

Off we went and he was mad, boy was he mad.

"Natasha Romanoff!"

We made it past another light in what had to be a land-speed record I might add, for DC anyway, as traffic can be notoriously bad. On that morning for whatever reason it was moving along quite nicely. Why he wanted to ruin my fun was just beyond me.

He gestured wildly at a side street and for whatever reason I turned down it.

Clearly I had lost my mind.

Down the street were shops and restaurants and I just happened to spot a parking lot for a restaurant that looked closed. Sharply I turned the wheel, sending him against the door as I whipped the Corvette into a parking spot. Then I applied an appropriate amount of pressure to the brake to lock my seatbelt.

I'd made up my mind. I needed one.

With both hands on the wheel I looked over to Steve and knew in that second we would be having our first fight.

Desperately he unhooked his seatbelt and pushed the shifter into park.

"Get out of the car! Out! I'm driving!"

My outrage was tangible and my hands remained on the wheel, "No! I signed for it! I'm driving! You don't get to have all the fun!"

He seemed shocked at the words that came from my lips.

He reached over and had my seatbelt unhooked with minimal difficulty.

I couldn't even remember exactly how it happened.

There was shouting and shrieking, pulling, shoving and I may have even bit him. Who could remember? Someone bit him. The horn went off. His sneaker wound up on the windshield. I wound up halfway out of my seat with one hand firmly grasping the steering wheel. He yanked, I elbowed, he kicked, I threatened not to give him any more backrubs and he countered with a threat to tell Maria I'd been the one using her email address for free trials.

It became a full frontal assault.

My fingers dug in his hair, gripped his sweaty t-shirt. His hands were on me. He held me close, pulled on my clothes. It was somewhere between struggling, fighting, an embrace and almost a kiss. His head smacked into the window. My lips ran over his neck, his throat.

His sneaker finally nudged my hand from the wheel. I wound up flat on my back with that divider shoved most uncomfortably between my shoulders.

In that tiny space he moved quickly and before I knew it he was on me. That console dug further into my back. His fingers sank into my hair. The weight of him on me made my heart kick up a few beats faster. He had to have felt it. My breath came out in a gasp that I know he heard, saw and felt.

He looked at me. I looked at him and realized that my feet were on the ceiling.

Instead of shoving himself away or moving, he surprised me by staying where he was with one hand in the back over my shoulder, one foot on the dashboard.

His fingers moved from my hand and softly touched my mouth.

I kissed his finger.

One of my arms was in a weird position underneath me. But righty was free and I reached up to touch him arm. I ran my fingertips over his firm bicep.

"Say my name again…" I whispered, my voice not quite as smooth as usual.

His fingertips smoothed over my face.

"Natasha."

His hand cupped my face as my chest pressed against his with every deep breath I let out.

What were we going to do? This wasn't good. He wasn't climbing off me and I wasn't shoving him off. I liked the way he felt. I liked the weight of his body against mine, the warmth of his skin, the way his looked at me. I wasn't a virgin. I wasn't opposed to using my body to complete a mission. My body hadn't been my own for a very long time and was more of a tool to me than anything.

But this, this was new.

Cutting someone away from the herd of my own choosing was not something I was intimately familiar with. It made my heart pound loudly in my ears. It made me feel nervous and reckless and curious.

When he did climb off me and pull his foot from up on the dashboard, he rested one knee on the driver's seat. Eyes never leaving me.

Clearly he had won.

Carefully, so as not to hurt, sprain, break or twist anything of importance, I shimmied backwards into the passenger seat. My eyes did leave his but when I glanced back up found his again.

"Steve?"

He had an answer for me, his breath came out deeply before he managed, "Yeah."

"Is this going into the private life box?"

Like a lightbulb clicked off in his head, he nodded and collapsed into the driver's seat. But he reached over to put his hand on the center console. Without a word I put my hand on his and gave it a squeeze. I was nervous, it was reckless but I couldn't stop myself.


	11. Chapter 11

**The next night…**

I was still picking glass out of my hair when I got Maria's message.

And I almost didn't check my phone.

I'd gone out to a bar to get drunk but only made it as far as ordering a drink, which I stared at while being disappointed at myself.

Seeing the horrified look on Steve's face when he realized that I'd been doing a side mission on a hostage rescue hit me right in my icy little heart. Seeing him realize that it probably wasn't the first time was worse. Seeing him realize that I was a liar dented something on the already dinged up suit of armor I wore. Sure I had succeeded and completed my mission. But I still felt guilty, as if I'd been caught doing something wrong.

Then almost getting us blown up was the cherry on top.

Old me would have been disgusted. Natalia would never have even cared what other people thought, or let things as disgusting as emotions bother her.

I was a mess.

In my jacket pocket my phone vibrated again.

After pulling another shard out of my scalp and dropping it onto the bar, I reached into my pocket and pulled it out while eyeing the vodka.

I almost didn't look at it.

Almost being the key word.

When I glanced down I saw Maria Hill had messaged me.

-Director Fury's been shot -

I was climbing off my barstool before I realized it and elbowed my way through the busy bar while sending a message back, asking what hospital he was at. By the time I made it outside, up a block and to my car, Maria had messaged me back.

Since the hospital wasn't far I got there quicker than even I expected.

Granted the thoughts that ran through my head began to pile and the next thing I knew I had arrived. Possibly parked illegally and running into the hospital before I could even ask I followed the trail of cops and Shield agents and security.

By the time I tracked Fury down he was in surgery.

There was a side room that looked out at the operating room which I managed to slide into. I ran up to the window and just stared in horror at the sight of my mentor, one of the few people who'd given me a second chance, believed that I could redeem myself.

There was so much blood, so many people around him, cutting into him, trying to save him.

It was a moment before I realized someone else was watching mere feet away.

It was Steve.

"Is he going to make it," I think I asked.

"I don't know," I'm pretty sure he answered back.

My eyes never left Fury as he fought, fought so hard to live.

I needed to do something, anything, I had to help. "Tell me about the shooter."

"He's fast and strong. Had a metal arm."

Like someone punched me in the gut then and there. My breath came out as I watched in utter horror, the memories dredged around, wrapping their icy fingers around my throat.

It couldn't be, it just couldn't.

"Ballistics?"

Movement came from my other side.

Maria's voice filled the room, "Three slugs, no rifling. Completely untraceable."

Words came out of me as if on autopilot, "Soviet made."

"Yeah," she whispered as everything became catastrophic on the other side of the glass.

Bells went off in my ears.

The floor felt like it vanished underneath me.

A feather could have knocked me over.

A realization that I was watching him die overcame me and I was numb. I couldn't feel my fingers or hands or feet. I watched everything. I watched as the doctors tried one last time. I watched them as they called his time of death. I watched them put down their medical equipment as people slowly left the room. I had to watch till I was the only one in there watching them cover him up with a sheet. I watched as if that was some sort of finality on a chapter in my life.

.

I stared at Nick.

I stared down at his face and felt my soul shatter.

It wasn't fair.

None of it was fair.

Staring at him dead on the gurney was the slamming shut of a part of my life. It was one more thing that I could not control. It was one more thing I had no say over.

Distantly, oh so distantly, I heard my name.

I managed one last breath before reaching out to touch him. My hand flattened over Fury's forehead. It was still, damp and cooling. It nearly broke me.

In that moment I knew I had to leave.

I had to go.

If I didn't get out of that room I'd never leave.

I had to get out of the hospital.

I needed to think, I had to think everything over.

Had it been the same guy? Had it been the Winter Soldier? How many guys ran around assassinating people wearing a metal arm? It couldn't be a coincidence. I didn't believe in coincidences.

My name was called when I made it out into the hallway.

When I saw Steve following me out I remembered hearing that Fury was with him when he'd been shot on my way in. That information had gone in but floated around and after watching Fury die, hearing about the metal arm…percolated.

Words came out of me. "Why was Fury in your apartment."

Steve stared, Steve thought about it.

Worst liar ever.

A child could have seen him thinking up an answer.

He didn't even sound like he believed what he told me. "I don't know."

I just could not even at that point.

As if on cue Brock came over.

In full tactical gear he spoke up making Steve turn. "Cap, they want you back at Shield."

Immediately Steve answered him, his attention divided between us, "Yeah give me a second."

That was the truth. He didn't have to think about it at all.

Undeterred Brock insisted, "They want you now."

I could not even begin to explain how suspicious that made me.

That timing was sudden, weird.

Fury wasn't even in the morgue.

In no uncertain terms Steve answered, not willing to budge. "Okay."

Brock walked off.

Steve looked back to me.

So much unsaid in his eyes. He was looking at me a little too hard, a little too intently. He wanted to tell me something. He needed to say something but it wasn't safe. There were too many people around and I was so desperate to get out of there I was itchy.

"You're a terrible liar," I told him.

I hoped he understood. If it could be said, I prayed he understood.

I had the very distinct feeling that people were going to start trying to kill us soon, him most certainly first.


	12. Chapter 12

Not that I wanted to brag, but, I was somewhat of an expert on coups.

Which meant while Steve actually went back to Shield to be debriefed, I did the opposite. I went around the Greater DC area to collect the money, papers and information that I had hidden around for such emergency situations.

After ignoring every page, call and message from Shield requesting that I come in, I threw my phone into traffic.

I'd gotten back to my apartment after Fury's death to find it trashed with a capital T.

Whoever had been there had done with hell of a job tearing it apart from top to bottom looking for something. It didn't take me long to assume it had something to do with Fury. It also didn't take me long to wonder if it had anything to do with Steve lying about why Fury was in his apartment. Not that I was about to call him, or track him down.

I didn't even shut the door to my apartment. I just left it.

By the time morning rolled around I'd decided that I needed to go underground. I had a plan. I had a way out of DC. I had money and a new identity stashed that I could pick up on my way out.

I'd just left a bank I'd been visiting to clear out one more safety deposit box when I passed a TV in the lobby.

There was a possibility I'd given myself whiplash from the way my entire body jerked back at the sight on the screen.

A few people were milling around watching the news bulletin name Captain America as a wanted man. My eyes went wide. My mouth gaped.

Oh Holy Mother of Bon Jovi.

That happened a lot quicker than even I'd expected.

Part of my plan on my way out of DC was to see him and warn him, but we were past that point. Not that I should have been shocked considering what a bad liar he was, of course Shield would have been able to pick up on that once they got him back there like a pack of wolves.

He'd been so shook at the hospital I hadn't pressed. I'd been too upset and I instantly regretted it.

Something had happened, Fury didn't show up at Steve's place for no reason.

I shouldn't have left. I shouldn't have let him go back to Shield alone. My mind raced. My thoughts jangled together as I began to wonder what Fury could have told him? What could he have known to get labeled so quickly as an enemy of the state?

Then it hit me.

Fury gave him something.

It clicked just like that.

The drive from the boat. Fury gave him that and that was why Steve was acting so sketchy. Sketchier than usual anyway. Before I knew it my feet were carrying me through the lobby towards the exit. I had to find Steve. I had to go get him before Shield killed him.

But where on earth would he go?

He wasn't stupid, he wouldn't go back to his apartment or mine. He wouldn't call anyone either. He wasn't a dumb man. He wouldn't have brought that drive back to Shield with him either.

When I got outside and under the bright sun I pursed my lips.

He would be going to get the drive.

Where would he had hidden it?

Rumlow had been pretty insistent, he would have been watching Steve like a hawk which meant Steve would have hidden it.

And that meant I had to beat him to the hospital.

Fortunately for me the hospital was only a few blocks away and I could only assume Steve would need time to change, regroup and find transportation. That alone would buy me a chunk of time to look around the hospital hallway from that night.

I'm not even going to lie.

My first few sweeps through the hallway weren't fruitful. Mentally I was cursing him up one end of the hospital to the other.

Finally, I took a seat in a chair a few feet away from where I'd called him a terrible liar to survey the area. I did my best to look pretty miserable so no one would wonder why I was there and honestly, it wasn't that hard.

Close to forty minutes passed before I realized I was over thinking it.

Forty whole minutes passed before I got up and walked over to one of the few permanent items in the hallway that no one would notice someone fussing around. My eyes travelled over the top and sides of the vending machine until something caught my eye, something that didn't quite belong.

That sneaky bastard.

Two packs of gum later I found a spot where I could hide and keep an eye out for him without being to conspicuous.

Lucky for me people in hospitals had more to worry about than little ole me.

Close to another hour passed before I noticed someone tall enough to be him.

Obviously he'd found a change of clothes.

I stayed in my chair, slouched down and watching on the off chance that it was just a tall built guy. When he walked right up to the vending machine that was my confirmation.

In one fluid motion I came up behind him in time to see his face in the reflective glass of the machine. I practically felt the air leave his lungs when he saw the gum was gone.

So I popped a bubble with the piece in my mouth.

He smelled like sweat and gun powder.

He must have had a big morning of getting shot at.

When he turned our eyes met, nothing but frustration and agitation in his gaze. He grabbed my arm and I was going backwards, back through a door that thankfully was cracked because there was a strong chance we may have gone through it.

Before I knew it my back hit a wall hard enough to make me grunt.

He was pissed.

He yanked the hood from his hoodie and hissed, "Where is it."

"Safe," was what instantly came out of my mouth.

My hackles started to rise as the nearness of him and his aggression put me a slight bit on edge. I was pretty positive he wouldn't hurt me. But he looked like he wouldn't be entirely opposed to hanging me off a building by my ankles for a few minutes.

"Do better," he told me.

Because why wouldn't he go there? Do better?

I could not even try to keep the hostility from my voice, "Where did you get it?"

"Why would I tell you," he spat right back.

I paused, mind working quickly to take everything in all at once and process. It then became clear to me. "Fury gave it to you. Why?"

"What's on it?"

What was I? A mind reader? "I don't know."

He couldn't reign in his frustration with me. "Stop lying!"

Immediately I clapped right back, "I only act like I know everything, Rogers."

He should have known. Why didn't he know?

Sounds of people passing drifted into the room making us both glance at the door that never quite shut behind us.

When his attention turned back to me he hit me with, "I bet you knew Fury hired the pirates, didn't you?"

More news for me to dissect as quickly as possible.

It took me a second or two to chew on that, place myself in Fury's shoes, consider whether it would be something that he was likely to do. "Well, it makes sense. The ship was dirty. Fury needed a way in, so do you."

Not that my answer satisfied him in any way.

He grabbed my jacket in pure frustration. Surprising me with how physical he was getting, how close to the edge he must have been between Fury's death and now being a wanted man. It was like watching a caged animal work out what happened and try to understand so it could form a plan of attack, possibly escape.

"I'm not going to ask you again!"

My eyes took him in closely, observed him as I considered what I could tell him. What I should tell him.

I didn't want him getting himself killed. Clearly things were evolving way past either of our control with everything that had happened over the past two days.

"I know who killed Fury," just came out of my mouth.

His gaze was focused in on me completely.

His hands fell from my jacket.

So I went on, hoping that I wasn't making a huge mistake. Cutting Steve in on my plan to start over somewhere warm with white sandy beaches was beginning to grow on me.

"Most of the intelligence community doesn't believe he exists, the ones who do call him the Winter Soldier. He's credited with over two dozen assassinations in the last fifty years."

He was neither doubting nor buying what I was selling. He seemed to just be taking it in for further evaluation. "So he's a ghost story?"

It occurred to me that he may not believe me.

He already thought I was a liar and obviously didn't trust me.

That bothered me.

If it had been anyone else I wouldn't have cared. But it wasn't just anyone, it was Steve.

"Five years ago I was escorting a nuclear engineer out of Iran. Somebody shot out my tires near Odessa. We lost control, went straight over a cliff, I pulled us out. But the Winter Soldier was there. I was covering my engineer so he shot him…" to prove it to him, I lifted my shirt. Because I needed him to know I was being honest. He needed to know I was telling him the truth. "Straight through me."

I watched his eyes look down at my abdomen.

"Soviet slug, no riffling." Then, so he understood the gravity of it all, as if the scar was not enough, I added, "Bye bye bikinis."

For a moment he chewed on that before telling me, "Yeah I bet you look terrible in them now."

In the hopes to get some sense in his head I dug into my jacket. "Going after him is a dead end. I know, I've tried." The plastic drive procured in proof. "Like you sad, he's a ghost story."

Quietly he took it from me, his gaze never leaving mine.

When he did speak it was calmly.

He wasn't as agitated. "Well lets go find out what the ghost wants."

Not that I had any illusion that our day was going to be rainbows and kittens from there on out.


	13. Chapter 13

"Here…put these on…" I told Steve, tossing a hat and glasses in the back seat of the Honda Civic I'd stolen. I'd found it in the hospital parking area and looked like it'd been in the lot for a while. I'd already made him change and drove us haphazardly through DC while we came up with a plan and checked to see if anyone was following us.

"What all do you have in that bag?" Came from the back seat which appeared empty in the mirror. Briefly I looked up with my eyes, before I found the absolute perfect parking spot in a underground garage, back in a corner.

Needless to say I looked around and then backed the little car into the spot to hide the rear license plate.

"Money, clothes, passports…stuff."

I could hear him jostling around in the back but was busy making sure I had everything in my backpack. Since we would not be returning for the Honda, I left the keys in it when I shut it off.

On our ride we'd had a good talk. Well, as good of a talk as two people could have when one was on the floor in the backseat of a stolen car. We had decided to not flee the country yet. We decided that we needed to see what was on the drive and what got Fury killed, what had made Steve a fugitive.

I told him everything that I knew about the Winter Soldier.

When my eyes looked up in the mirror all I saw was the back seat. "You ok back there?"

His head popped up with the chunky glasses on while he adjusted the back of the baseball cap. "Yeah…" he sounded a little distracted. It wasn't a stretch to say he had a lot on his mind.

If he said he was ok, then I was going to take his word for it.

I watched him closely in the mirror of the small vehicle.

It hurt watching him swim through whatever was going on in his head. I couldn't help it when I made a suggestion. "I'll go in the mall and see if I can see what's on this…why don't you look for a car or something so we can get out of here? I'll be gone ten, fifteen minutes tops."

His eyes met mine in the mirror. "I'm ok, Nat."

I held his gaze closely, watching him for any of those signs of dishonesty from him. So either he was being honest with me that he was indeed ok. Or we had two very different interpretations of what 'ok' meant.

Both became evident to be true when I led him up outside then into the mall.

Steve was distracted for the entire stroll all the way inside, but once inside he seemed to snap back and glance around at our surroundings. He followed me as I set off to find the Apple Store.

"What are we doing here?"

Obviously he'd been incredibly lost in his thoughts.

Leave it to a whole bunch of civilians to bring him back to the here and now.

"We're going to the Apple store."

Like I was speaking Portuguese to the man.

"Why?"

He was looking around way too much, way too suspiciously.

When I stopped walking he bumped into me.

Oh dear no, this was not going to work. Was it possible to be too straight and narrow to go on the run?

Fortunately for me the mall was pretty busy. People milled around us as I stepped closer to him. I stepped well into his bubble of personal space and fidgeted with his clothes as a girlfriend would. "Steve calm down or going to get us both caught and then killed."

His attention went to me.

No one hovered or slowed when they walked past is and into Yankee Candle.

Was I absolutely devastated over Nick's death? Totally and completely.

But I also didn't want to die.

I could grieve later.

I also didn't want to bury Steve next.

Knowing exactly what it was he needed to hear, I reached up to tug on the baseball cap. "There are numerous exits here and plenty of places to hide. This is the best place to try and get into that drive. If you act any more twitchy I'm going to sit you on that bench with a hot pretzel to wait for me until I'm done."

He actually looked over at the bench that I'd pointed at, "I'm not twitchy."

"Calm your toes and try not to draw attention to yourself. You're making me uncomfortable. So do better." Which I sincerely hoped would help fire those engines to get him a little more comfortable with being a wanted fugitive with a price on his head. Maybe by the end of the day things would be different, you know, depending on how things went in the Apple store.

When I set off again he followed me, slightly less obviously twitchy.  
He was going to be the death of me.

"First rule of going on the run is don't run, walk," and yes that was a jab.

He may not have been comfortable with being in my shoes yet but he was able to clap right back. "If I run in these shoes they're going to fall off."

Well that was progress.

He was doing better.

Wordlessly he followed me to the Apple store at somewhat of a brisk pace which was another improvement.

Once inside I found a row of computers that would work and weren't too crowded. Clearly there must have been something going on somewhere else in the mall.

Steve followed me and was right there, at my side. He watched over my shoulder as I sorted through the mess that the previous person had left on the computer. He was close enough to push me against the black standard Apple table.

Once everything was ready I had to break the bad news to him. "The drive has a Level Six homing program. So as soon as we boot up Shield will know exactly where we are."

He sounded better.

He sounded more like himself for which I was super thrilled about, "How much time do we have."

My fingers and toes were crossed. "Uh…about nine minutes from…" I popped it in and prayed it worked on the first try "…now."

Steve then checked his watch, glanced around and stood even closer.

It was a good thing.

One of us needed to take the initiative and keep track of time.

I could all but feel warning bells going off in my head.

After some doing it became clear that fuckery was indeed afoot and Fury had been right on the money.

Steve noticed it too and leaned in more. He placed a hand on the table to both get an even better view and block passer-bys from seeing what we were doing.

"Fury was right about that ship. Somebody's trying to hide something," I updated him. "This drive is protected by some sort of AI. It keeps rewriting itself to counter my commands."

"Can you override it," he asked, sounding even more like himself now that familiar proverbial waters were beginning to lap around his ankles.

"The person who developed this is slightly smarter than me…slightly."

And I really really hoped I was right about that nine minute window.

Getting shot at the Apple Store was never how I ever pictured myself going out.


	14. Chapter 14

No wonder Nick Fury hired the pirates.

The more I dug into the disc, the more I felt the familiar feelings of something shady sink their hooks into me. "I'm gonna try running a tracer. This is a program that Shield developed to track hostile malware." Maybe that would work, or help in some way. "So if we can't read the file maybe we can find out where it came from?"

"Can I help you guys with anything?

Oh my God, why?

Clearly the red in my ledger was still wet because we were just not catching a break. Helpful Apple Store Employees were so not what I needed in that iffy nine minute window.

So I plastered on a smile and reached for Steve, because he was going to soldier on. "Oh no, my fiancé was just helping me with some honeymoon destinations." It was neither hard nor difficult to summon up some bubbly happy energy when your life was on the line. Hopefully Steve caught on to the signs I was giving him. To be sure I squeezed him, hugged him and went back to the computer display.

Indeed he did being that team player and all.

"Right…we're getting married."

Apple-Man stepped closer. "Congratulations. Where are you guys thinking about going?"

Steve backed towards me, leaning in to both shield and look.

"New Jersey," he said, not quite believing it himself.

"Oh….." Apple-Man sounded surprised. A moment paused and I thought we were done for, up until I heard, "I have the exact same glasses."

I could neither contain my eyeroll or what came out of my mouth.

"Wow, you two are practically twins."

I was only half paying attention to them at that point.

But I did hear him refer to Steve as a Specimen and tell us his name was Aaron. Which was pretty close to Apple-Man. Maybe I had some kind of a gift?

Ever polite, Steve thanked him and off Aaron went to help real customers I could only assume.

A second later Steve was at my side lifting his sleeve, "You said nine minutes, come on."

Half my attention remained on the computer, "Shh, relax." A second or two later I couldn't hide my smile, "Got it."

Wheaton, New Jersey zoomed in on the map on the screen. It seemed to completely capture Steve's attention. Which slightly concerned me. He was just getting his sea-legs back it felt like. "You know it?"

When he told me, "I used to. Lets go," and pulled the drive out of the laptop I felt a smidge better. He was sounding more like himself. Things seemed to be making sense to him, or possibly falling into place.

Whatever it was, I was glad.

I was not wearing appropriate footwear to safely carry him if he got himself shot. I would so twist an ankle in my boots.

Leaving Aaron the Apple Man behind we headed out into the mall of people with Steve quickly spotting the Shield operatives.

Not that it was hard.

Even in a sea of shoppers they stood out.

Steve began to give me their locations, a fully formed plan of attack for him and escape plan for me which was so sweet, but so not going to happen. Not in a mall full of people with tons of cameras that could make him out to be some sort of crazed fugitive. There was a time and a place to fight. And sometimes there were better options.

Two Shield agents were approaching us from the front but I could tell that they hadn't spotted us. Whether our civvies were that kick ass, or they were trying to cover too much ground between them, I didn't care.

What I did care about was keeping him off the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List. "Shut up and put your arm around me. Laugh at something I said."

This was not the course of action he'd anticipated, "What?"

"Do it," I repeated.

It felt like he waited till the last second, but he did it.

His laugh was a bit wooden but we could work on that later.

His arm stayed around me when we passed them and he looked to see if it had worked.

I was all kinds of proud.

I was also all kinds of looking for a way out while he focused on our surroundings. My hand snaked into one of his beltloops and I drug him behind me towards the escalator.

We could go down and out, grab the backpack and then find transportation to God only knew where New Jersey. How long that would take was just beyond me but it was a start.

For fucks sake.

Coming up on the opposing escalator as we went down was Rumlow.

Immediately I turned before I could catch his attention and looked up at Steve, who was way up there on the step behind me. "Kiss me."

He couldn't have been more surprised if I slapped him.

"What."

"Public displays of affection make people very uncomfortable," was what I told him, as if he knew where I was going with this line of conversation.

"Yes they do," he completely agreed with me.

In that minute I knew he'd gladly take on the entire Tac-Team again to avoid what I was selling.

Oh for fucks sake. I would shoot him myself.

Because I too was a team player I reached up, grabbed him by his neck and pulled him down to my lips. I kissed him. But it wasn't what I would call a kiss. There was no real lip action and his hand sort of hovered near my waist.

It only lasted as long as I felt was safe before I pulled away.

I'd met bank hostages who were less rigid then him at that moment in time.

Since we were getting close to the bottom, I asked as I headed down those last few steps. "You still uncomfortable."

I really hoped he was behind me, because I was on a mission to get out of that mall. Hopefully before it had more Shield agents than shoppers.

"It's not exactly the word I would use."

Oh good he was following me.

On our way our Macy's I grabbed the backpack where I'd stashed it in a display, flinging it on before he could grab it. It was a little heavy with the weight of his shield in it but I wasn't about to complain.

A couple times, I peeked back when I passed something with a reflective surface to make sure he was still back there and he was.

Steve only spoke to me when I pushed my way out the heavy glass exit doors that put us out on the street.

His voice came from somewhere behind me, "To the left."

To the left I headed.

I knew the Metro was up ahead and he'd mentioned using that to get out of the city. Since we had a destination it would be so easy to meet up there in a day or two to figure out what was on Fury's drive. So I headed to the metro assuming that Steve was either behind me, on his way, or would meet me in New Jersey. It wasn't like we had a ton of options.

Quickly as I could in heeled boots, I went down the stairs and had just made it to the bottom, when I was steered sharply to the right by the backpack.

In a reflective plastic of a Metro Map I caught sight of Steve. With that knowledge, I went where he shoved assuming that he had some type of a plan, or course of action. You know, something very Steve like.

For crying out loud, we were super legit on the run now.

Instead, what I got, was him hissing at me in a dirty corner of the subway station while people came and went around us. "Don't kiss me like that again."

My mind was unable to comprehend what he was going on about, "What?"

Was he made again?

Jeez, he was just going through the full spectrum of emotions and it wasn't even Happy Hour.

I didn't realize he'd yet again backed me into a wall until the backpack hit it. Even then, he didn't stop coming and I had to look up to see his burning eyes. "Don't kiss me unless you mean it."

I was at a total and complete loss for words.

"I'm not a mission or a target. Don't touch me or kiss me unless it's for real. Don't make me wonder if you did it because you didn't have the choice."

He might as well have slapped me.

I could feel the color leech from me. I could feel my mouth go dry as his words sank in.

I had no response.

We were supposed to be on the run not wading through my life's worth of baggage.

"Do you want me to touch you?"

We didn't have time for this.

Every second counted when you were on the run.

"Yes," came from me in a hoarse whisper that I couldn't be sure that he even heard. Up until he leaned down to kiss me.

When he did kiss me it was soft. It was gentle. His mouth was every bit a young guy from the good old days. Back when men held doors open for women, held back chairs for them and dancing was chaperoned. It was sweet and nice and not at all what I expected, or could have thought up.

It was respectful and not something I'd ever experienced.

His hands however were far from gentlemanly.

They slid down my sides and lower till his palms spread out on my waist. His hands travelled down my hips then around to pull me close to him. No space was between us as he held me tightly against him. It really surprised me and made me gasp against his mouth. Especially when his hands sank into my bottom and quite literally lifted me up off my feet to pull me up closer.

That was both new and unexpected.

His hands pulled me up off my feet and harder against him, like it was nothing. There was nothing gentlemanly about how he held me, touched me and I couldn't get enough of it. My arms wrapped around his neck. I kissed him softly, softer than I'd kissed anyone in my entire life. I let his lips brush over mine content with how hungry his hands were for that moment.

It felt so good to feel wanted, desired.

For a just a moment I forgot we were on the run. I forgot we were under the streets and surrounded by constantly moving people. I even forgot we had to go to New Jersey.

Who forgets they have to go to New Jersey?


	15. Chapter 15

**New Jersey**:

Our final destination in New Jersey was allegedly five hours away, if you forgot about traffic.

Otherwise it was more, so many more hours.

I napped. I ate horribly unhealthy gas station food. I napped some more.

Finally, I folded my legs up underneath me as countryside rolled by the windows.

Steve had been driving and suffering no horrible side effects from the gas station food. I on the other had was beginning to wonder if I was suffering from indigestion, or if I was having a heart attack.

Another pressing question needed to be asked since leaving the state of Maryland.

"Are you sure you're feeling ok? I've never seen anyone eat six gas station sandwiches and I'm concerned. You'll let me know if you're feeling nauseous, lightheaded or experiencing any chest pain?"

I'd never seen him eat.

Oh I'd seen him eat around company.

But I'd never seen him 'eat.'

How many times had I heard about his accelerated metabolism? Of course that would require a significant amount of food for him to stay that size.

Plus he washed it down with a gas station coffee.

I was slightly concerned.

That was something friends did, right?

"You will be the first to know if I begin to experience any discomfort," he smiled from behind the wheel.

Did the super soldier serum mean he never got indigestion?

It wasn't fair.

"Can I ask you something?"

My head rolled to look at him, "Sure? Between friends?"

That smile grew.

Something was on the tip of his tongue and I could see it. He almost said it. Instead he went with something else entirely. "You don't seem to be too bothered being on the run. This can't be good for your plans to make amends."

Honestly, I hadn't given it that much thought.

Everything that happened after Fury died was a bit of a blur. It was like a blackhole of utter chaos. But he was right. My personal growth and path to good personhood was a bit at risk with the fugitive path I'd hopped on.

My lips went to the side.

"It's a work in progress. Besides…you just figured out how to work your phone. You'll die out here on your own."

"Ok first of all…" he began, taking his eyes off the road to point at me in a mildly threatening manner. "I can work the cell phone. I just don't want to work the cell phone. It's pointless. If you would answer your phone when I call instead of sending me one of those messages, we could save so much time."

My deflection of the subject had worked beautifully. Yet I settled back into my seat feeling a bit uncomfortable. So I went on while watching a pasture of cows pass. If I didn't have to look at him, maybe I wouldn't have to deal with it. "Being a wanted fugitive seems to be my default setting. At least now I'm doing it for a good reason."

He seemed to be ok with that answer.

As a train crossing came into view up ahead, complete with flashing lights and a actual train, he slowed down.

"What do you miss most about Russia?"

I couldn't even hide my shock at that question.

My head whipped to the side so fast I gave myself a crink. As my hand went up to sooth the burning fire in my neck I cried out, "What?"

He gestured at the dash, "There's nothing on the radio."

"There is plenty on the radio. You just don't want to listen to it," I shot back.

"It's vulgar," was his response.

If he wanted to see vulgar, I would gladly show him vulgar.

The thought made me smile and Steve frown, "What? What's that face for?"

He could never know, he might never fondle me again if he knew.

"Dumplings," was what came from my lips. "Pelmeni…with sour cream and dill. I used to go up the street from my apartment in DC and get them at this little mom and pop place. Whenever I ate them they'd remind me of growing up. My mother would always make them on special days. She'd make them with pork because she knew that was my favorite."

Something resonated in his gaze at that last bit about my mom. I could see it in his eyes. He may not have grown up in Russia. But he grew up somewhere far away like me. "What'd your mom make just for you?"

A not quite smile, but very warm expression came over his face as he looked at the passing freight train.

When he looked back at me he told me. "She'd, she'd save money throughout the month because it was just us. She'd save supplies and make this apple dessert. It was like a coffee cake with apples on the top and something crunchy. We'd sit in the kitchen and have a piece with coffee late at night. I don't even know what you call it but I could always smell it baking outside our building. The smell of apples always makes me think of her."

IXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIXIX

When we eventually made it to the old decommissioned and abandoned military base, it didn't take long for us to find the exact spot that had been on the Apple Computer Demo.

By then it was getting dark. Bugs were coming out.

My phone was proving to be at the end of its helpful capacity.

Leave it to Steve to find the one building that didn't look like it belonged.

Even I was wowed by his observation skills.

He'd make a killing in Vegas.

All I saw were old abandoned concrete bunker buildings.

Steve looked directly at one before informing me. "Army regulations forbid storing ammunition within five hundred yards of the barracks. This building is in the wrong place."

For which I'd have to take his word as gospel.

What I would have given to have had an old map of the original place to see if the building was part of the original construction.

After that things progressively went downhill at an alarming rate of speed that shocked even me.

We found an old computer behind a hidden wall downstairs.

Steve found out that Doctor Arnim Zola had not only survived the war, but had been brought to America as part of the Operation Paperclip Program. His consciousness apparently lived in the old computer, which I could not even.

We both found out that Hydra had not ended with the war.

We then found out that Hydra had grown within Shield since the war ended. Which meant all my time with Shield was time with Hydra.

Talk about a punch to the throat.

To top all of that off, Shield then tried to blow us up.

I could hardly believe it either.

This had actually become the worst week of my life. The one man who never looked at me differently after finding out everything horrible about me was dead. All of life's work was apparently in the name of evil. Yet again I was a wanted woman. And, my employer felt the need to blow me up with Short Range Ballistic Missiles.

My last vivid memory of our time in the bunker before the concussive explosion was hot heat. Heat that swarmed around us and the heavy oppressive weight that rained down on us both. Distantly I remembered jumping into a vent in the ground. I could remember huddling down into that small concrete space as everything around seemed to catch on fire. All the air was sucked out as fire consumed the space above us. Steve's shield was above our heads, clanging deafeningly as debris slammed into it from above.

It was a first for me.

A lot of people have tried to kill me before, but never a computer program.

Who knew a computer program would be the one to succeed?


	16. Chapter 16

So, it turned out I wasn't dead.

I really thought I was there for a few moments.

When I opened my eyes there was darkness. When I started to come around there was almost total silence. There was a stillness to the air, a cool crispness around me. I was convinced that I'd died. I was sure I'd been blown up by the Hydra Computer Algorithm.

It turns out I wasn't dead, I was just in New Jersey.

When it suddenly dawned on me what had happened, I could smell my singed clothing.

Violently I jerked awake. Shocked to find I was outside on the soft earthy ground.

When a hand covered my mouth, an instant reaction to fight overcame me. My body reacted before I could think twice and I began to fight back.

A strong arm wrapped around me and Steve's voice softly whispered, "It's me. We're safe."

I did relax a little. But that didn't stop the few heavy breaths that escaped from me.

When I glanced around I could see we were in the woods, really deep in the woods somewhere. We were in the woods because Shield tried to kill us, because they had been infiltrated by Hydra and had killed Fury.

Remembering it all was just horrible.

I actually laid back down on the ground and on Steve's shield.

I needed to be on a flat firm surface so I didn't fall.

I heard and felt Steve sit down beside me more than saw. He brushed against my legs before he asked. "Do you think Fury knew?"

That thought hadn't even crossed my mind.

"The night he died, when he showed up in my apartment…he told me Shield had been compromised."

I couldn't bring myself to react one way or the other.

I'd just got blown up so I was going to need a moment. My hand covered my face. After a second I wiggled all my fingers to make sure I had them all. They were all present and accounted for.

"Do they think we're dead?"

There was not a bit of hesitation in his voice, "No."

Which meant we'd have to get somewhere safe in the very near future. His hand came to rest softly on my knee.

"We need to get back to DC," was about all I had to offer on the matter. He made a noise of agreement and I racked my brain for places we could go that Shield, nay Hydra wouldn't find us.

Clint was out of the question even if he was in DC, which he wasn't. Tony was a huge no and I couldn't even remember where he was, same could be said for Banner and Thor. There was not a doubt in my mind that our pictures weren't all over Maryland and two states out in all directions.

"I know somewhere we can go," Steve announced.

This led me to sit up but not stand.

"Do we have a plan? I'm with you no matter what, but, you know, out of mild curiously." Since we weren't just looking for the Winter Soldier. Now we had Hydra to deal with too. I couldn't help but feel that a plan would be necessary.

"I'm working on one."

That good news led me to sag against him.

"Suggestions are always welcome," he added before we both heard it.

Soft sounds.

Barely there sounds.

Something in my brain clicked through all of that mess of the past seventy-two hours.

A sense of imminent mortal danger would do that to a person. Call it a mix between a life's work and women's intuition. Just as Steve began to react I had my feet pulled up, pivoted sharply his way and kicked him as hard as I could with both feet. I hit him square in his side.

It sent him sprawling, which said a lot because he was considerably heavier than I anticipated.

Thank God I wasn't skipping leg day.

No sooner had I done that, did the air where he'd been explode in several well placed bullets. Had he still been there he would have been hit center mass.

This sent me scrambling over the shield as bullets followed me.

I scrambled low and grabbed that big hunk of Vibranium. Once I lifted that up I could feel the impact of bullets bounce off. Something sharp stung my leg as those bullets followed me.

Which was a good thing.

If the bullets followed me they weren't following Steve.

If I could draw their fire long enough maybe, just maybe, he could see a little better than me in the dark?

Then it came…that most beautiful sound of bones crunching, soft grunts, high impact sounds of fists hitting bodies. Yet there were still bullets coming at me. Which meant there was someone else in the woods. Someone else that wasn't having their life flash before their eyes courtesy of Steve.

Based on my powers of deduction alone, whoever was shooting at me had to have had some form of night vision apparatus. Since it was pretty near total darkness and those well placed bullets were hitting the shield every time.

Therefore, those well placed bullets could potentially hit Steve.

I was unsure if that super soldier serum extended to night vision? Which was a bit of a negative. But on a positive note, I could tell where the shooter was at based on where their bullets were coming from. So as I ducked behind a tree for cover, bullets followed me and I switched the shield to my other hand.

Quickly as I could I swung out from behind the tree. Then flung Steve's shield like a underhanded frisbee.

Since it was so light it wasn't difficult.

A few more bullets hit the tree. Spraying me with splinters and bark before I heard the most satisfying sound, sounds of the shield making painful contact with a human being.

No sooner had I come out from behind said tree with the full intent to make that person cry out some more, did I hear additional noises in the dark.

Shield on human type noises.

Sounds of Steve being gloriously reunited with his shield filled the dark night air. And what a sweet reunion it was, I might add. I found myself wince a bit as I listened to the violent noises that followed of someone getting pummeled with that shield.

I waited a second because I couldn't see a damn thing.

Plus it sounded like he had things under control and I wanted to take a second to pat myself down. To be super sure I wasn't bleeding.

A soft noise came not too long after that, an agreed upon 'all clear' noise we'd settled on a while back which found me hurrying that way in darkness.

After a bit of stumbling, I managed to find my way over to Steve without falling on my face. Why did I ever go on the run without night vision goggles? What had I been thinking? This was me. Of course I'd wind up getting blown up and shot at in the woods of New Jersey.

When I found Steve I grabbed his sleeve. "You good?"

"Other than your shoe print on my ribcage I'm fine. No bullet holes?"

"Not yet," I told him somewhat optimistically.

When he told me we had to keep moving I wasn't too surprised. That would have been a subject I brought up in the very near future if he hadn't.

As he began to move, I grabbed one of the back pockets of his jeans. "You know where we're going? Right?"

"West," he told me.

It was a good thing it was dark. Or he would have seen the expression plus eyeroll directed at him.


	17. Chapter 17

**Still New Jersey…**

Come dawn we managed to stumble upon a glorious and beautiful, majestic sight that I couldn't have been happier to see.

A truck stop.

Never in my life did I ever think I'd be so thrilled to see one.

Upon seeing the back of it in the distance, through the forest, I could have dropped to my knees. I was that happy.

Steve came to a stop beside me and reached over, pulling a hunk of leafy thorny twig from my hair. "That really looks like the last of it."

I'd never been able to take time, a break or one of those Gap Years, or summers off that I hear about, to go find myself. But I was almost one hundred percent positive that I was not a camper, or naturist.

Somewhat concerned, I reached back one more time to run my fingers through my hair to check yet again that there weren't anymore spiders or webs. I needed to get out of the woods before I hurt someone. "I'll go steal a car."

Steve grabbed my arm.

I was about to ask him if he wanted to go buy a car, but he spoke before I could hit him with that much sarcasm so early in the day. "Why don't we hope in one of those semi's? Someone might call the cops if we steal a car from here."

Ok, well that made sense.

If I was Shield/Hydra I'd be keeping an ear out for stolen cars in this general area.

He then moved forward.

I grabbed his arm, "What are you doing?"

He gestured to the trucks.

"No," I firmly told him as I would Tony. "You're not going anywhere with that shield. Between the two of us, who here is on trading cards? I'll go scope out the trucks."

It sounded reasonable to me.

His arm shot out to prevent me from moving, "No. We're not splitting up. What if Shield has people there? They may have cops there too looking for us."

Well, he wasn't wrong. That was also a real possibility.

"You know Rogers…I've never been on the run with every law enforcement agency in the world looking for me. I mean, I've been kicked out of countries. There are still countries I'm not allowed in. I'm pretty sure there are a few contracts out on my head floating around out there. But this…this is new. I have to say I completely underestimated you. I'm glad we're friends. Things were getting pretty stale in my life. It's been ages since I've been shot at in my free time."

The look he gave me oozed with so much annoyance I could have touched it.

"Maybe I'll take you out to dinner this week? I wouldn't want things to get stale."

I couldn't begin to stop myself.

"Great! Are we going to rob a bank? Flee to Vegas to gamble everything away while trying to get you drunk? We could probably find a fight club if we're lucky."

"That all depends. Are you even allowed in Vegas?"

It had finally happened, some of the ice around my black heart began to chip.

I had found another friend. Ever since Clint ran off and got married I'd seen less of him. Granted I'd never kissed Clint and he never let me use his bow and arrows. But it seemed he was a differen type of friend, a friend-friend. Steve was edging into the partner in crime bubble.

"Yes," I snapped right back. "Just not at Caesars."

I was never allowed back at Caesars.

Turning so my back was to the truck stop and I faced him, I put my hands together at the palms then laced my fingers together minus my pointers which were directed at him. "Until you take me to dinner…we have to find a ride. You can't go around the truck stop with your shield and I'm not riding in the back of a semitruck for fiveish hours. So what do you want to do?"

His nose scrunched up. Those eyes of his looked over my head at the truck stop. "Lets walk around it. Maybe our luck will change."

I highly doubted that, but didn't want to be a Debbie downer.

"Where are you taking me to dinner?"

His eyes looked down at me. "Obviously not Caesars."

Yes, obviously.

Being so close to him, so close to the broad expanse of his chest, I noticed something. I looked him over. I cocked my head to the side and took his shield from him. "You know Roger's…your chest is about the same size as your shield…take off your jacket."

His eyebrows met.

But he listened to me and yanked it off.

It took some creative doing.

Once I got that brown coat zipped up the front I shoved his shield in it Using the sleeves and hood I managed to make a little handle and fully conceal the weapon. Only then did I hand over the shield. "There," I muttered more to myself than anything. "Pull up your hood and you can come too."

He didn't seem too impressed but he didn't argue with me.

Sure enough he yanked his hood up.

It wasn't much, but it was the best we could do with what we had.

Our luck it seemed had improved somewhat.

We never made it fully around the pretty big rest stop.

The two of us trekked along the edges of the parking lot and hopefully out of camera range, eyes peeled for a car that looked like it may have been sitting for an extended amount of time. Because I didn't want to sit in the back of a truck trailer without air conditioning, in the dark, guesstimating where we were.

We'd walked past the service station, restaurant and gas station. We strolled through rows of vehicles and drifted ever closer to where the large semis were parked.

Morale was not high.

Then it happened, a motorcycle buzzed by us at a high rate of speed with two riders on it.

Both of us stopped and watched.

The motorcycle skidded as the brakes were applied. The BMW motorcycle fistailed and somehow the driver managed to save it while the passenger flailed wildly.

How could we not look?

The two riders hopped off before they turned it off. One helmet came off and I was doing serious amounts of mental math. If the young man was old enough to be out of high school, I'd eat my shoe. He shouted loudly in an excited sort of way.

The driver flipped his face piece up to reveal an equally young male face. He then said words that sealed his fate, not bothering to take the keys from the bike. "Come on. I grabbed my Dad's credit card too. We can get snacks!"

They stole their father's credit card and I could only assume that BMW bike.

Which meant they'd hopefully hold off on reporting it stolen for as long as possible.

Both of us watched them stumble through the parking lot loudly, excitedly, as only teenage boys committing felonies could.

"So…" I implored.

"Yes," Steve answered immediately.

Once those boys had tumbled into the store we hurried over to the bike which was black, looked fast and had those boxy saddle boxes. Granted it only had one seat. I was team player and wasn't about to complain.

Steve grabbed the passengers full face helmet and handed it to me before climbing on. We'd have to be quick. I yanked the helmet on while he shoved his shield between the bike and saddle boxes. Not that I cared. Once the helmet was on I got a good strong whiff of Axe Body Spray. Had the kid bathed in the stuff?

I zipped up my jacket, climbed up on the back of their Dad's bike and did my best to get comfortable.

Finally I patted Steve's shoulder to let him know I was ready to go.

Anything to get the smell of that body spray flowing out of the helmet.


	18. Chapter 18

**Late that morning…**

"That's the guy from your run."

If Steve was surprised at all by my exceptional powers of observation, he kept it to himself. Either he'd noticed that particular skill I possessed some time ago. Or maybe the overpowering smell of male body spray had become too much for him to bear.

"Sam Wilson," he eventually told me.

We'd managed to get back to DC without getting caught and track down Sam Wilson in what had to be record time. BMW made a quality product that surpassed even my expectations.

Sam lived in a nice townhouse community. Thankfully most of those people were at work when we came wandering through singed from getting blown up. Disheveled from the motorcycle ride. Steve needed to shave. I smelled bad teenage choices. We did not look our best.

However we did not go running up to Sam.

Instead we watched as he went into his home and then watched for a bit just to see if anyone was following him. Only when we were positive that the coast was clear did we head over to Sam's place.

I led the way up the back stairs with Steve not far behind me.

While I knocked he kept an eye out.

After a moment the blinds went up and the door slid open to reveal Sam, fresh from his run and clearly surprised at seeing the two of us on his doorstep.

"Hey man," he greeted us, taking in the sight of us both.

Steve was downright apologetic. "I'm sorry about this. We need a place to lay low."

It was in that moment, I realized just how much I wanted a safe place to sit down and take a breather for a bit. The mere thought that he'd turn us away made me panic. It made me worry about where on earth we could go next. It made me want to convince Sam to help us.

This led me to chime in softly, "Everyone we know is trying to kill us."

Sam was quiet for a moment. His dark eyes bounced between Steve and I.

To my great relief he then said, "Not everyone."

When he stepped aside to let us in I could have hugged him.

Stepping into his nice, normal, new and pristine home was like having a weight lifted off my shoulders. I couldn't stop myself from sighing in relief.

"In my guest bathroom there's a first aid kit. It's under the sink," Sam spoke up becoming my new favorite person on earth. I looked at him and he pointed towards a door in the hallway past his kitchen.

Steve probably wanted to talk with him and I wanted to wash my face. So I thanked Sam as sincerely as possible then went off in search of the guestroom and first aid kit. I honestly did not care what they talked about.

Off I went and with minimal effort found his guest room and the bathroom inside of it.

Immediately I went to the sink and got a good look at my ash smudged face. I looked as bad as I felt. This led me to take a few deep breaths before I knelt down and dug under the sink. Easily I found a big white plastic box. It was full of familiar things that I could use blindfolded with a hand behind my back. They were things that I knew well and were somewhat of a comfort. Some people had ice cream and TV. Other people worked out or shopped.

Weaponry and first aid were my normalizers.

Plopping down on the bathroom floor, I shed a few layers till I got down to my black tanktop and could see the tender spot on my arm that I'd been ignoring.

All things considered the wound wasn't that bad.

It was the size of a small potato and wasn't bleeding anymore. I managed to pick out threads from my shirt out of it and rubbed my thumb along the edge where my skin was singed. It wasn't that deep, just a few layers of skin. Not that I wanted it infected. So I grabbed various supplies from the box and cleaned it as efficiently as possible.

I'd just begun to smear some numbing antibacterial salve on it, when the sound of feet drew my attention.

After capping the tube I looked up and up to see Steve come in with an armful of clothing on his arm.

"Sam gave us some things his sister and brother-in-law left that might fit."

I was becoming a fan of Sam.

I sincerely hoped my gratitude showed. No longer being chased, or having someone actively try to kill us was giving my mind to rest, rest and wander. My mind never went anywhere good when left to its own devices.

"Has he been watching the news?"

Steve set the clothes down on a nearby hamper and came to a crouching position beside me. He totally ignored my question as he looked over my arm before I could slap a big bandaid on it. "Do you need ice for that or anything else?"

I shook my head.

When fingers softly trailed down my arm I glanced back at him again. Before I realized it, I'd leaned back against his knee. I didn't really know what to say and the fact that he didn't seem to need me to say something was a relief.

Instead I reached up to touch his face and brush at a smudge of something from our trip to New Jersey. His face had a fair share of smudges.

My thumb brushed over his bottom lip slowly. He let my fingers softly brush over his lips and chin, smooth along the edge of his jaw and down his throat. Explore the contours of his face and commit the feel of him to my memory.

"Say something to me in Russian."

What could I tell him in Russian?

He was learning it, or had been, along with several other languages at Shield. But who knew now what the future held.

As my fingertips touched his chin I decided on something. "_Pick me up for dinner on your motorcycle._" My fingers went up his cheek and pressed against the warm firm skin. When my fingers slid up into his hair, he didn't seem to mind. When I pulled him down closer to me there was no hesitation on his part. When I kissed him there was gentleness until my tongue touched his. That tenderness was quickly replaced with a hunger from him. My grip in his hair tightened as I pulled him closer. His mouth became more demanding of me. I couldn't get enough from him but a little voice chimed at me that this was neither the time, or place.

Very unhappily I broke the kiss and whispered against his lips. "We shouldn't do this here."

He nodded in agreement but then he leaned forward and pressed his lips against my neck.

There really was nothing I could do other than tilt my head to the side and close my eyes. His lips were soft. His teeth were gentle when they scraped my skin, making goosebumps break out on my arms and legs. His fingers combed through my hair when his mouth lifted from my neck.

"God that helmet stunk." He spoke softly by my ear, making me smile as only he could.

"I'll try not to smell like another man next time."

"Or maybe a man that didn't bath in aftershave."

"I'll do my best," was my promise.


	19. Chapter 19

Sam made breakfast and I ate that kind of thing.

I ate the hell out of that and when I'd polished off a plate heaped with eggs, toast, fruit and a big cup of orange juice, I put the empty plate in the dishwasher and contributed to the past events that the boys were bouncing off one another. "So, the question is…who in Shield could launch a domestic missile strike?"

Up at the counter, Sam continued to butter toast as if we were discussing who had the best chances of winning the Super-bowl that year.

Was this how it felt to be normal?

Sam was a normal guy and hadn't run out of his house screaming. Maybe there was hope for me yet?

"Pierce," rolled right off Steve's tongue.

Not a trace of his two helpings of breakfast was left of his plate. Yet he had not gotten up to put his plate in the dishwasher.

He was skirting the line of normal too.

"Who happens to be sitting on top of the most secure building in the world," I could not help but remind him. I even eyed that empty dish on my way back to the table he was seated at, not that he seemed to notice. His mind was elsewhere, lost in a sea of deception and duplicity. It was like he was wading through my early twenties.

"But he's not working alone. Zola's algorithm was on the Lemurian Star."

"So was Jasper Sitwell," I reminded him, which made him look up my way.

I could see the realization go through his eyes at my reminder.

Right, that had happened.

It felt like forever ago, but it had only been days and was probably relevant.

Steve then posed the question that made my little heart kick up a few extra beats in excitement. Because it was exactly my idea of a perfect day at work. "So, the real question is, how do the two most wanted people in Washington kidnap a Shield officer in broad daylight?"

Sam moved around in the kitchen and I hoped he hadn't begun to seriously question the life choices he made when he let us in his home.

Kidnapping Jasper wouldn't be too difficult. I'd seen him work out at the gym, he wouldn't be the issue. The issue would be his security detail and him being out in public.

Fortunately Sam had a plan. He walked like a man with a plan. He came out of the kitchen with a manila folder that wound up on the table. "The answer is, you don't," he told us, making me wildly curious as to what was in the folder. What had Sam been up to while I'd been cleaning the smell of long range missiles and teenage boy from my hair and face?

Already on my feet, I had that folder in hand just before Sam told Steve it was his resume.

Was it possible that Steve had found a friend who could offer us new and fresh degrees of bad behavior? My eyes scanned over the folders contents and things became clear. My eyes went to Sam, "Is this Bakhmala?" Steve was so getting a silver sticky star for this. "The Khalid Khandil mission, that was you?" Even I was impressed. I'd heard about that mission when I was off in Brasil, which said a lot about Sam. Steve however did not get a gold sticky star. I couldn't keep the slight surprise at his lack of detail from my voice when I directed my next remark to Steve. "You didn't say he was a Para-Rescue."

Of course he'd not ask those probing questions.

Inside the folder was a picture of Sam with another soldier in the Para-Rescue uniform. Which I handed over over Steve's way.

Steve's eyes went right to it, "Is this Riley?"

"Yeah," Sam's voice was a little softer telling me Riley was no longer with us.

Which also told me Steve had asked other questions.

His sticky star was upgraded to gold.

Sam's face was full of guilt, grief and emotions that I was intimately familiar with. I could not help myself from asking in the hope it'd distract him from those memories. "I heard they couldn't bring in the chopper because of the RPGs. What did you use? A stealth chute?"

Sam came closer, "No." He handed us another folder from the table, "These."

When Steve flipped open that folder and saw the pictures, he couldn't conceal the surprise. "I thought you said you were a pilot."

Steve really needed to start asking people he met on the street better questions.

I found myself peering over his arm and admiring the tech in the pictures. Wondering just how hard it would be to acquire such useful things and if there was a steep learning curve.

"I never said pilot," Sam told us, that smile returning and earning a forever place on my good side.

The two of them went back and forth for a few moments while I looked through those papers for useful information for a later time. Old habits dying hard and all that jazz. Somehow I just knew that Sam would be joining our merry band to now avenge Fury, destroy Hydra and maybe track down the Winter Soldier, just depending on how things went. I was not one hundred percent solid on that latter part.

When Steve asked where we could get our hands on his flight suit, I glanced up.

That would be useful information.

Sam sounded a bit let down as he explained the futility of his situation. "The last one is at Fort Meade, behind three guarded gates and a twelve inch steel wall."

Steve immediately looked at me.

I shrugged then shook my head in a positive response.

That just sounded like my idea of a good time. It'd be good practice for me since we were taking on Hydra and maybe the Winter Soldier.

"Shouldn't be a problem," Steve assured Sam, dropping the weighty papers back on his table.

It was I who spoke up before they could enjoy too much happiness. "I'll get that today. You two should start following Sitwell around to get an idea of how much security he has now. Plus we should find out his schedule for the next couple days."

It'd be a good way to break Sam in. Plus we couldn't have him breaking into Fort Meade and making him a wanted fugitive on his first day with us.

Agreeing with me, Steve only had one thing to add, "Just don't murder anyone."

God I missed Clint.

"I promise to be good," was what I told him in response. My attention then went to Sam, "Do you have a garage I can grab a few things from?"

"A few things," Steve couldn't begin to hide his skepticism.

Sam, bless him, was already turning to lead me to his garage. He was so one of my new favorite people. And I made sure that the look I sent Steve conveyed that sentiment. "I'll keep my eyes on the news in case I need to break you two out of jail today."

"Do me a favor, don't take too long to catch up to us when you're done."

At that I turned to follow Sam.

Only when my back was totally to Sam did I blow Steve a kiss. "Don't wait up."


	20. Chapter 20

It took me longer than expected to get Sam's wings since I promised Steve I wouldn't kill anyone. In total, it took me two and a half hours. But once I had it in my possession, I took it back to Sam's house to hide in his walk-in closet.

After that I didn't directly go find Steve and Sam.

I made a few stops and calls to check in with various individuals, associates, sources and snitches throughout the world and locally who may have had some useful information for me, or not. Since I didn't want to drag the two of them around while discreetly placing calls and checking in with people all over Metro DC, I didn't manage to track Steve and Sam down till well after five that afternoon.

It didn't take too long to figure out where Jasper would be, or to get downtown to the social club he was at which was hosting some big dinner. After that I spotted a loud and crowded bar full of people having the times of their life. People that included what looked like the first stop of a bachelor party and a baseball team celebrating a big win.

It was the perfect place to hide among bodies.

Without much difficulty at all I slid inside the packed establishment and wandered a bit till I found my boys.

The two of them were seated up at a high table by a window and seemed to be heavily involved in a baseball discussion. However I knew better. That view out the window looked at the Gentleman's Club and it's parking area to the side.

When I approached the table I flashed them my biggest smile, "You fellas have fun today?"

Both their heads looked my way.

Sam gave me a big smile. Steve cocked an eyebrow, "Were you good?"

In genuine good humor, Sam laughed. "How you gonna ask her a question like that? She just got here. She hasn't even ordered a drink yet."

Immediately I gravitated towards Sam and gave Steve the stink eye. As Sam waved for a waiter I climbed up on the stool beside him. "Thank you Sam."

Steve rolled his eyes at me.

So I lifted my foot up and plopped it right down on his thigh. Serendipitously, it was just the perfect distance away from me under the table. If it surprised Steve, he didn't react. The only way I could tell that he noticed was when his hand skimmed over my jean clad calf. To which I straightened my leg out to get it further up his leg.

A young college aged dude with dreads came by and took my order for an iced tea and extra guac on Sam's chicken nachos that had already been ordered.

Once he left I looked back across the table at Steve almost haughtily. "Yes I was good. I got it and didn't kill anyone."

Sam's surprise couldn't be contained, "You got it?"

"It's in your closet," I told Sam, my gaze wandering past him and out the window. "How did you two do today?"

"Late morning tomorrow is our window," Steve spoke up as screaming broke out a few tables down at what appeared to be a bridal party. Or so I assumed from all the penis shaped gummy candies on necklaces. "It's the only time he'll be outside of Shield. He's never without his security."

With the sound level in the establishment being comparable to that of a sporting event, I figured we could talk openly so long as we weren't being loud or incredibly detailed.

"He has a driver and two to three guys with him all the time," Sam chimed in around the time Steve's hand traveled under my jeans. His fingers trailed over my ankle and found a slight raise of my skin where I had a burn scar.

"From what Sam and I figure, it's doable. We'll have to be creative and make sure everything lines up. What'd your snitches say? I assume that's where you've been all this afternoon?"

Our table quieted down when a few quiet sober people walked by with a waiter to their table a few tables down.

Once they passed Sam asked, "You have snitches?"

I couldn't help myself. "I have snitches that report on my snitches."

Sam looked to Steve who nodded that it was indeed true.

My iced tea was dropped off by a passing waitress and I took a hearty sip before going on with the tales my informants told. "So, apparently, everyone thought Shield was evil so no one had any real information on that for me."

Neither Steve nor Sam were impressed.

"But, they were all aware of the Winter Soldier. They're all terrified of him and told me that he's not staying in any of the local places. No one knows who he works for or anything about him. So he's not anywhere underground. Which leaves only one possibility."

"When the most obvious solution doesn't fit, it's time to start considering the most outrageous," Sam said, completely ending that line of thought for me.

It made Steve frown, "Hydra?"

I shrugged.

Sam leaned back in his seat, "That'd make the most sense. If all of Natasha's espionage contacts had nothing to do with him. He'd contract with someone who they don't."

"So he'd be Hydra's hitman."

I sort of shrugged at Steve's observation. It sounded legit to me.

Our dreadlocked waiter returned with a large platter of chicken nachos with extra guac for Sam, plus a burger with fries for Steve. It was perfect timing if I did say so myself. I hadn't eaten since breakfast and Sam didn't seem to care that I dug in to his dinner. To not push my luck, I stole Steve's pickle and a few fries.

It did not escape my notice that Sam checked his watch a few times as we all ate. Well, we ate, Steve devoured his burger like it was a religious experience.

It was on the third time that I asked, "Got a hot date?"

Sam gave me one of his good natured smiles before he grabbed his soda to finish the last of it. "A PTSD group meeting down at the VA."

Not taking his eyes off his burger, Steve mumbled from across the table. "I told him to go and keep up like everything's normal. Just in case."

That sounded like a good idea to me.

Sam stuff several more chips in his mouth before he left a few bills on the table. "Can you guys get back to my house ok? You need a key?

I cocked an eyebrow at him.

He smirked, "Why'd I ask that, ok. I'll see you guys later."

I saluted him and Steve bid him a fond farewell through a mouth of food.

When Sam left I pulled my other foot up into Steve's lap since before Sam would have noticed. In companionable silence we ate till his plate was empty and he began to pick at the remaining chips on my platter.

"What's left to do," I asked.

A hand touched my ankle and made its way up my calf. "We need a place to interrogate Jasper."

Pondering that, I scooped up the last of the guacamole and popped it in my mouth. "I know a few places we can check out. Do you want to go now or stay here a while longer?"

It was a legit question.

However, the choice was taken away from us both when what could only be described as a brawl broke out over by the bar and pool tables, a mere stone's throw away from us. Both our heads turned to watch this melee go down and several young males from a fraternity if their shirts could be believed, jumped on in.

My heart sank.

For crissakes, we were going to have to leave. That much became obvious when I noticed the bartender was on the phone. I suspected with 911.

"We gotta go," Steve announced, gently pushing my feet from his lap and standing. He pulled his wallet from his pocket and threw enough money to cover food and drinks on the table. On the other hand, I hopped down and made sure we hadn't left anything incriminating behind.

As the brawl grew louder, I spotted a sign for the bathrooms as several waiters and people from the kitchen came from that way. A shining sign from above for a back way out. "This way…" I motioned to Steve, "There should be a different exit out this way."

Sure enough there was.

I mean, once we wound our way around people swarming in the chaos and got down the hallway, past the bathrooms and kitchen, to a big metal door that pushed open pretty easily. It had been propped open with a brick so I wasn't worried about an alarm going off.

I slowed to make sure Steve was still behind me. His hand touched the small of my back to encourage me forward. "You get a message to Clint?"

"Yep," I nodded, eyeing the back alley. It was well lit but dirty, stinky and I could hear glass crunch beneath my shoes. I'd got a message out before getting to Fort Meade incase Hydra tried to contact him to trick him into doing something, or using him to draw us out.

Mostly because that would be something I would do in their shoes.


	21. Chapter 21

"This'll work perfectly," Steve nodded, looking out over the expanse of the third building roof I'd led him to within the five mile radius of where we planned to abduct Jasper from the next day. "No one works on the top floor?"

He had wandered across the roof while I stayed near the stairwell.

"No one works on the top three floors. It's all storage and empty office space. There is a private elevator that we can put out of order signs on tomorrow." I told him, arms crossed. My eyes took in the bright city lights of DC as I leaned against the stairwell wall and watched, somewhat relaxed. Well as relaxed as I was going to get at that moment in time.

My eyes looked upward at the night sky.

The stars weren't as beautiful and plentiful as other night skies that I had seen, but there was still something special about a night in a big major city. A city had its own life to it, noises and colors and vibrancy.

"How'd you find out about this building and everything?"

A little smirk was all the answer I gave him.

Steve shoved his hands in his pockets as he approached the edge of the roof, then peered over to see what was below.

"Tell me more about the Winter Soldier. How is he in a fight?"

I took a breath and breathed out through my nose in thought, ran my tongue over my teeth as I pondered his question. I watched him walk along the roofline to get a feeling for the perimeter and answered his question the only way I could. "A lot like you."

This made him glance my way in surprise.

"He likes guns and knives," I also added. "And he's strong." I stopped short of saying juiced up. The Winter Soldier was my only failed mission. He was the only one who had managed to kill someone I was charged with protecting. There was almost something legendary about him in my mind. He was a complete enigma. He was what nightmares were made of and semi-regularly visited mine. Always to remind me that I had failed in saving my engineer. "Very well trained too, very cold. Detached."

Even though he didn't verbally respond I knew he heard me.

He nodded as he walked the rooftop and peered over the sides.

When he eventually made his way back to me I knew he had a good mental image to put on paper for Sam. Whenever Sam got back to his house I foresaw a significant amount of mission planning in our night.

Steve came to a stop within arm's distance from me. Even in the dim light from surrounding buildings, I could see his expression.

"You think Hydra is going to send him after us?"

"It's a possibility," was his answer.

My eyes looked back out to the city lights. Out past the roof where the Winter Soldier was out there somewhere, the only man to ever shoot me without the intention of killing me.

Steve stepped a little closer.

My eyes went back to him.

"Did your associates say anything else that could be mildly helpful?"

My lips pursed to the side, "Several asked me to pass on job offers. If we live through this week we'll be able to find gainful employment."

He stepped even closer to me till our shoes touched. "That's just great."

He was close enough to me that I could feel his legs brush mine. Even with his hands in his pockets, he was big enough to take up a considerable amount of my personal space.

"We can always stick to bank robbing," was my suggestion right before he leaned in.

He leaned down and brushed his lips over mine with such familiarity, you would have thought he'd been doing it for months. He brought a little smile to my lips for a brief second. My hands slowly unwound and found their way around his waist. Right about the same time I found myself completely pressed against the brick wall of the stairwell.

Steve was more demanding and I enjoyed it.

Was it the right time and place? No. But this was us and we'd never be normal. It just was not in the cards.

My core temperature seemed to kick up a few more degrees. My heart kicked up a few extra beats as I did my best to keep up with his mouth, his lips and tongue. It was both exhilarating and overwhelming. My hands slid up to yank aside his soft t-shirt and feel his stomach. His skin was almost feverish beneath my fingers. When I scratched his flat stomach he almost bit me.

Not that I let that deter me.

My hands skimmed around his waist to pull him closer. My fingers nails sank into that firm flesh of his back. "What? It's all I can reach." Was it my fault he was that tall?

In response his hands reached down and hooked around my thighs to pull me up like a true gentleman. If you excused the way he held me up in his arms by my bottom. Not that that lasted long, only long enough to press me against that brick wall securely, long enough for me to wrap my legs around his waist.

He had the audacity to ask, "Better?"

Slightly elevated now, I sank my fingers into his hair and looked down at him. "So much better…I'm going to write an open letter to Cosmo." When I kissed him I could feel his smile, feel his hands softly touch my stomach and sides, slide up into my hair.

A sudden buzzing against my thigh signaled the end of our rooftop party.

In the back of my mind I pinpointed the location of the phone to his jacket pocket.

Against his mouth I had to ask, "Why do you have a phone? Are you trying to get us arrested?"

Steve didn't even stop kissing me. "It's Sam's." He was coming along quite nicely.

Was I to assume that Sam was home?

Since he made no movement to remove either of his hands from my hair, or the small of my back. I stopped kissing him and reached down into his pocket for the piece of technology. Thus giving him access to my neck. I couldn't help but laugh softly when his teeth tested the firmness of my collarbone.

Upon seeing Sam's text that he was home, I showed Steve and kissed the top of his head.

"That was quick," I mused.

"It's been a little over three hours," he told me.

Oh, well, it didn't feel like that long.

With a resigned sigh I unwrapped my legs from around his waist and eventually found my spot back on the ground.

It probably was time to get back to work.


	22. Chapter 22

**Sam's House**

I'd made myself comfortable in the middle of Sam's couch, with a new bottle of black nail polish I'd found in the guest room bathroom and a glass of wine. The fire was going and on the TV was the ID Channel. What more could a woman have wanted for on a nice night in?

While I painted my toe nails Steve and Sam hashed out the plan mere feet away. They did so on a pretty large dry eraseboard that Steve found in the garage.

We'd chatted about it on the way back to Sam's house.

Oce back, I chimed in with helpful information, things they over looked and comments in general while they marked up the board with all the dry erase markers.

That went on for a couple hours and by the time it was over my toe nails looked great, we had a plan and I was almost positive we were going to live through the week.

There wasn't anything office supplies couldn't make better.

By the time they had finished, I had already collected a pillow and blanket from the guest room and made myself a little bed on the couch.

Steve frowned at me when I turned the TV off and told both of them. "I'm going to sleep. You two are free to stay up and whatever, but try to keep it down."

"Nat," he sighed.

Sam didn't seem confused. Sam had a sister, he understood me. "She'll smear her toe nails if she sleeps in the guest bed. Plus I don't think you're going to fit on the couch."

Sam was now up there in my top three favorite people.

I looked Steve up and down as I flopped back and made myself comfortable, "Roger's most definitely will not fit on the couch. Plus he knows better than to come near me when I'm sleeping."

Sam looked at Steve in his nice cozy living room as I dimmed the fire with it's remote control.

"We were on a…"

"Work trip," I supplied, remote in hand.

"…yeah, a work trip. I woke her up because our work jet landed and she punched me in the face."

Sam's eyebrows rose.

Steve managed to sound totally normal when he added, "Twice that happened, so don't try and wake her up."

It was true.

I never woke up softly and slowly and gently like other little girls. More times than not I woke up fast and sudden, confused, sweaty with my heart pounding as my brain frantically tried to figure out if I was safe. With a single nod directed at both of them, I wiggled my toes and closed my eyes. "Turn off those lights and make sure I'm up with you guys."

They listened, I heard them turn the lights off and file out of the living room.

I heard Sam ask, "She really punched you in the face? Twice?"

Steve answered, "I'm pretty sure she broke my nose that first time."

The two of them put a smile on my face and before long I found my mind drifting, eventually I fell asleep.

Falling asleep was never an issue for me.

Staying asleep was the issue.

Unfortunately, that night was an issue.

That night I dreamt of the Winter Soldier.

It shoudn't have been surprising considering how much he was on my mind.

In my dream he was as real as that day when our paths crossed in Odessa. He was just as cold and distant and inhuman. Everything was in my dream. The car accident and the terror on my engineer's face when he realized that the Winter Soldier had found us. His terror had been tangible and at the time I didn't understand. I dreamed in vivid detail our escape from the car and getting shot, the burning pain when that bullet ripped through me and out my back into my scientist. I dreamt of my terror and agony. My dreams were consumed with his terrified screams of pain and his last moments alive in my arms. My dream was full of blood and pain and terror and those heartless eyes.

On that night my dream ended sooner than normal.

I couldn't even say how long I'd been asleep, or how long I'd been dreaming.

All I knew was my body was ripped out of my tormented slumber violently. My body reacted when something touched my leg. My body reacted before my brain caught up. I found myself in an upright seated position grabbing desperately at whatever it was that had touched my calf. Frantically a feeling of not being safe, not being alone, screamed at me. Inside my ribcage my heart pounded. My eyes searched the room for any danger while my hand found the fireplace remote. By then my eyes had adjusted enough for me to see a big figure that took me enough by surprise that I flinched. Till I realized that it was Steve.

Steve must have tossed the remote at me from a safe distance away.

Immediately guilt filled me.

"Is she ok," came from somewhere behind me.

Shame, shame was there too.

I could feel myself deflate. My hands went to my face and I sagged back down onto damp cushions.

"She's fine," Steve softly answered in the almost dark since the fireplace was still on. "I'll be out here with her. You can go back to bed. We're ok."

No, no I was not, the utter humiliation was real as I realized my clothes were damp too from sweat.

When I heard him settling down on the coffee table a foot or so away, I lowered my hands and looked at his shadowy figure. "You can go back to bed too. I'm fine."

He didn't listen to me.

"Really Steve, I'm ok."

"I'm not leaving you alone," he told me in the dark.

Loudly I blew my breath out my nose. I really didn't want to talk about it, or him to see me so agitated and sweaty and twitchy.

"We both know you're not going back to sleep. Either I'm going to lay down on the floor right there, or you can come in the guest room with me."

In the dark I glared.

I didn't even know if he could see me or not, but I made sure it was extra hostile.

When he got up and began to get down on the floor between the couch and coffee table, I sat up. A slew of profanities and curses aimed at him spewed forth from my lips in Russian. Irritably I grabbed the pillow and blanket and stood up. Without a word directed his way in English, I stormed past him and out of the living room. Just in case he was unaware of how I felt about the situation.

Had Sam not been in the bedroom across the hall, I would have slammed the door.

I did swear loud enough for him to hear the Russian coming from me, just in case he got any funny ideas about talking to me.

The guest bedroom was darker than the living room, telling me Steve had gotten out of bed so quickly he hadn't turned a light on. He was such a good person it was frustrating at times. Since I couldn't remember what side of the bed I'd grabbed my pillow from and I tripped on a pair of shoes, I wound up crawling up the middle of the guest bed.

Somewhere between the foot of the bed and middle, I abandoned the blanket.

After feeling around I found the empty left side and dropped there with the damp pillow.

I could not begin to express how I happy I was that he wasn't trying to talk to me. He just plopped down on the other side of the bed and made himself comfortable. As my eyes adjusted to the room I could make out light from a streetlight outside. It didn't offer much in the way of room illumination but I found myself staring at it.

It wasn't too long before I heard Steve's breathing deepen enough that I knew he was asleep. Not long after that I heard Sam start to snore softly.

You could imagine my surprise when the next thing I knew, I heard a muffled door shut.

My eyes opened to a dimly lit room. It was somewhat lit telling my brain that the sun was on its trip across the sky.

When it dawned on me that I was somewhere new, I lifted my head and looked around. Things started sliding into place, like remembering the past few days and then that there were neighbors on the other side of the wall. Distantly I could hear snoring from out in the hall as my eyes looked at the blinds for the streetlight that had vanished in the lightening morning.

I was shocked that I'd fallen asleep after my dream. That was a first for me.

When I turned my head to the right, my eyes found Steve's blue ones watching me and it made me cringe slightly in surprise.

I hadn't expected him to be awake, or so quiet.

A sigh escaped from me and I reached up to adjust the pillow beneath my head. "What time is it?"

"Six," his voice was rough in the morning.

Of course it was six.

Because I was a hot mess, I found myself touching my hair to make sure that it wasn't doing something weird. My hands pulled down on the grey t-shirt I'd gone to sleep in and reached to pull the blanket up over my legs. There was not a snowballs chance in hell that I looked slightly better than I felt.

Like most men I knew, Steve only looked better the more disheveled and roughed up he got. So naturally mornings would be no different. Sometime over the night he'd flipped over and fallen asleep on his front. His hair was messy and there was a hint of stubble on his face. The white t-shirt he had on had risen up to reveal a few inches of his back.

He looked good enough to eat.

I felt like one of those bugs splattered on the windshield of a car.

It wasn't fair.

I reached over. Well, that wasn't true. My arm flopped over on his pillow. My fingers slid into hair and began to softly comb through the short golden strands. It must have felt nice because it wasn't long before his eyes closed.

More sounds came through the wall from next door.

They made me pause and listen, curious to see if I could determine what exactly was happening in the adjoining townhouse.

This led Steve to take my hand, drawing my attention back to him. He laced his fingers between mine and brought my hand to his mouth. I watched him kiss my hand, knuckle by knuckle, finger by finger. He kissed the palm of my hand and pressed his teeth against the side of my hand. He looked at my nails. Then he shoved our clasped hand beneath his pillow and eyed me closely.

"You were dreaming about the Winter Soldier."

My eyes went up to the ceiling, "Yeah."

"Say something to me in Russian."

My eyes found their way back to his and I thought about it. I still was unsure how firm his grasp was on the language. "_You're a cover hog._"


	23. Chapter 23

There was something about hurling someone off a roof that guaranteed their immediate compliance.

Normally, it could only be achieved by means of trickery.

Like if you did it at night and kicked them down into a net, or onto an awning, or they thought they were higher up than they really were.

There was something about falling from a really high height that just completely freaked people out.

Which was why I was so surprised when Steve strongly encouraged me to throw Jasper Sitwell off the roof we'd found. To be honest, I was only half paying attention. My eyes were watching the streets below to see if there were any signs of Shield looking for our kidnapped Shield Officer. My eyes were peeled for Sam and his wings, as he should have been arriving momentarily.

So when Steve not only told our kidnapee that it was so not his style to throw someone off the roof, but followed that up with it being mine. I could not feign surprise in looking at the two of them.

When Steve stepped aside to give me a safe space to work, how could I not?

A brief thought that he must have had some sort of plan in place, because he really wasn't about to let me hurl Jasper off the roof crossed my mind. Especially after all the work it took to abduct the man.

In a downright cathartic sort of way, I planted my heeled boot square in Sitwell's chest and powered through, sending him backwards off the roof, screaming too I might add.

I really expected more from Jasper.

Then it hit me. The little elusive thought that'd been floating around since Sam told Steve his cousin was both single, and a big fan, after I threatened that I would sign him up for eHarmony over breakfast.

It was all good naturedly of course. A way to joke and fill the time in the most stressful of circumstances. Like smoking I assumed.

"Oh, wait…what about that girl friend accounting?" I asked, snapping my fingers as her name hovered just out of reach. "La…Laura…Lis…"

"Lillian," Steve threw out there. He clearly remembered the cute tattooed blonde with the big blue eyes and hourglass figure that millions would pay good money to obtain.

He then glanced my way, "Lip piercing right?"

"Yeah," I agreed. "She's cute."

I'd throw him off the roof too if he brought her around me. But it was fun to role play with the people we were attracted to. Hearing their responses and seeing their expressions was good practice for real life.

"Yeah," he agreed but not with much enthusiasm. "I'm not ready for that."

Before I could even start to tease him about piercings, Sam found us, Jasper in hand. Jasper was in one piece too. I had to hand it to Sam for his professionalism. I was deeply impressed.

When he dropped Jasper onto the roof and landed seemingly effortlessly, I had some hope.

Maybe this would work?

No sooner had Sam's wings tucked into their carrier high on his back, did Jasper began to frantically talk, perhaps even shriek.

Getting thrown or kicked off a roof really put one's priorities in place.

The closer we came made Jasper get on his hands and knees. He threw a hand up to protect himself from us. "Zola's algorithm is a program…for choosing…Insights targets."

Well that was new.

As leader and official spokesman for our trio, Steve took the lead and demanded, "What targets?"

Still a little emotional he cried out from his hands and knees. Gesturing at Steve, "You!" After a breath or two to collect himself, Jasper went on. "A TV anchor in Cairo, the Undersecretary of Defense, a high school valedictorian in Iowa City. Bruce Banner. Stephen Strange, anyone who's a threat to Hydra! Now or in the future."

Sam looked at me and I looked at Steve.

Steve could not seem to believe it either. "The future? How could it know?"

Jasper seemed to think it was funny. Maybe I needed to throw him off the roof again?

"How could it not?" Something seemed to change in him and he stood. As if finding his way back to whatever high ground he thought he had to perch on. "The twenty-first century is a digital book. Zola taught Hydra how to read it." He was almost proud when he told us that last part. Looking between Steve and I, he went on, like a teacher explaining a concept to students who should have known the answer. "Your bank records, medical histories, voting patterns, emails, phone calls, your damn SAT scores." He even seemed to grow in confidence. "Zola's algorithm evaluates peoples past to predict their future."

He definitely needed to go off the roof again.

As I pondered the logistics of that, Steve asked, full understanding evident in his tone but it was like he wanted to hear Sitwell say it. "And what then."

Jasper hesitated.

"Oh my God. Pierce is gonna kill me."

I was pretty sure Sam would help me toss Jasper off the roof.

Steve's voice rose, "What then?"

Sam grabbed the back of Sitwell's jacket, likely to be sure Jasper didn't try to hurl himself off said roof as the realization of what he did became obvious.

Finally he told us, but without any real enthusiasm. As if he wasn't thrilled with that part of the plan, but realized it had to be done to get to the next step of whatever waited behind his own personal finish line. "Then the Insight Helicarriers scratch people off the list. A few million at a time."

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

There'd be no throwing Jasper off the roof.

Not yet anyway.

Jasper pretty much hadn't stop talking since we'd shoved him in the back seat of Sam's car and took off. For someone so worried about Shield not liking leaks and Pierce having him killed, he was pretty chatty.

Eventually Sam couldn't deal with his problems and snapped at him from the front seat.

"Why don't you try sticking a cork in it?"

I was more concerned about a different problem entirely. Leaning forward I gently reminded Sam and Steve, "Insight's launching in Sixteen hours. We're cutting it a little bit close here."

Clearly Steve had been thinking about it too cause he had an answer for me, literally the second I stopped speaking.

"I know. We'll use him to bypass the DNA Scans and access the helicarriers directly."

Which wasn't a bad plan. It would need to be fleshed out some but we had that dry erase-board back at Sam's place.

Jasper however was having absolutely none of it and he leaned forward, as I leaned back into my seat.

What?!" He demanded, "Are you crazy? That is a terrible, terrible idea."

I didn't think it was that bad of an idea. He probably just didn't want me using him as a human shield.

A loud thump came from above as the roof of Sam's car bent.

We all heard the metal bend and feel the glass fly as the window behind Jasper exploded in.

None of us had so much of a chance to react.

Before I could even think a metal arm came through the window, ripped Jasper out of his seat and out through the window, then hurled him into traffic. Instinctively I lunged for him but it was all so sudden, I was too late, again.

Movement past the window made me look up, then I heard the Winter Soldier move forward on the roof.

It was a gun, he had a gun.

A bullet came down through the roof between Steve and Sam and instinctively my body moved before I even thought twice. Absolute desperation to save the two of them from the same fate as Jasper and my Engineer.

I lunged through the space between the two front seats and into the passenger seat, ontop of Steve. My arm wrapped around him, pulled him forward onto me as I kicked Sam on the shoulder hard enough to send him against the door. Just as more bullets came down through the roof of his car, where both of them had been seconds earlier. Pieces of car interior flew around as the acrid smell of gunpowder filled the car.

Before any more bullets rained down upon us, Steve grabbed the gear shift and slammed it into park.

Sam's car skidded, likely never to be the same ever again and then, then the Winter Soldier flew off the roof and onto the three lane highway.

We watched him slide along the road until he managed to stop himself with that metal arm and eventually stand up on his feet.

My hand went down to grab my gun from my hip. As I had every intention to shoot that man through the windshield. After everything he had done. It would be a fitting end. I'd gotten him in my sight knowing the first round out of my gun would be slightly askew having the journey of going through that windshield, but the second round would find its way home.

Something slammed into us from behind destroying that dream. Sending my gun to the floor and glass everywhere. When we kept going forward it became clear that the Winter Soldier was not alone.

Then he was back on the hood of our car.

Sam did his best to slow his car down while I reached down for my gun around Steve's feet.

Not a second later the windshield rained down on Sam as that metal arm came in and ripped out the steering wheel.

It was around that time my hand found my gun. Sam began to swear while I began to shoot up at the Winter Soldier through the roof before he could return the favor. After a few thumps it became clear he'd jumped back on the car that had rammed us.

And there it was again, ramming us again, shoving me into the dashboard as Sam was unable to do a thing to control his car.

My own eyes looked around desperately to find a way out as the car went from one lane to another recklessly, slamming into the dividers and a feeling hit me that had everything to do with physics. We were going to wreck.

Steve shouted at Sam, grabbed me around the shoulders crushingly tight.

Before I knew it the car hit something else, the door my back was pressed against was gone and the terrifying sensation of falling came over me for a second.

Up until I realized that I wasn't falling alone.

Steve and Sam were falling with me.

Just like a roller coaster ride, my stomach knotted. My hair flew around my face. Air blew through my clothes. I watched Sam's car go past us. It all happened in a flash but it stretched, it felt like we fell forever.

Somehow, someway, we all landed on the road, on the car door with Steve's shield up under my back. Both Sam and Steve clung tightly to the door. Sparks were everywhere as we slid across the road. Our feet bounced violently on the pavement and all I could think was we'd get run over by the Winter Soldier. I swore I caught a flash of him go by, or as we went by, I couldn't tell, it all happened so fast. I managed to both get thrown around like a rag doll and be pinned to the shield and door so tightly, I felt suffocated.

Suddenly Sam wasn't there but I still couldn't breathe, I held my breath and prepared for impact with a car.

As the car door slowed, I could make things out better.

I could see the Winter Soldier on the hood of a Humvee up ahead. I could see they were a car length, maybe two, up ahead.

My body was clenched so tight that I realized I still had my gun.

My mind began to race as that Humvee came to a stop and we slowed. I could feel Steve move around on top of me and prepare for the attack that would come, just as I was, too.

Once it was safe to move, I got to my feet and saw Sam run behind a silver minivan for cover.

That looked like a good start to me.

It was then I saw it, the both of us saw it.

The Winter Soldier with what looked like a weapon capable of firing a grenade at us.

Steve partially shoved me as I headed for cover, assuming he'd be right behind me.

Up until I watched in horror as he took the full impact on his shield and go flying back. In a cloud of fire he was thrown hard enough to bounce off the roof of a Ford and continue on off the overpass entirely.

From below came the distinctive sounds of crashing vehicles, horns and glass shattering, people screaming.

And then came the gunfire.


	24. Chapter 24

Oh my God, there were civilians everywhere and bullets were still flying.

Both Sam and I dove behind the van for a just a second. We needed to regroup because the plan was gone, shot to hell, up in flames, poof, gone with the wind. Steve was somewhere below the overpass and the Winter Soldier had mercenary friends.

Yet this felt normal.

"We need to draw their fire away from the civilians and keep the Winter Soldier distracted away from Steve." I told Sam as I began to fire back at them.

He spoke words that just sang to my heart. "You want the high ground or the low ground?"

Did I want to be on or under the overpass?

"I'll take the low ground," I told him knowing I'd have an easier time getting down there and he was used to having a birds eye view.

I peered around the van and then motioned for Sam to go, that I'd cover him and returned fire. There were enough vehicles between us that I'd see anyone coming, they wouldn't be able to sneak up on me.

Sam ran for a better position.

I returned fire and then both saw and heard the grenade bounce my way.

So the Winter Soldier had more grenades. Neat.

Over the divider I hurled myself as glass and shrapnel went flying.

When they continued to shoot at me through oncoming traffic, it became clear that I needed to get off the overpass ASAP before someone got killed. If there was a positive, all of them were shooting at me which gave Sam some extra time.

Quickly as I could while getting shot at and avoiding cars, I made my way across those three lanes while digging out some of the work tools I'd stolen over the years, just around the time I heard another grenade get launched my way.

Not looking twice, I hurled myself off the overpass and engaged the climbing tool meant to scale buildings for infiltration.

The metal loudly connected with the concrete, allowing me to swing down and avoid sudden impact with concrete below, or the car that followed me down. That metal on concrete sound was the best sound on earth.

Once my feet hit the ground, I was already moving, running to assess the situation down there with cover above me for that moment in time.

Civilians.

More civilians, they were everywhere. How was it possible there could be so many people around?

Shadows from the bridge above alerted me that the Winter Soldier and company were looking for me.

Up ahead I could see a bus on its side and Steve's shield on the ground. And more people, so many people.

I looked up to see the Winter Soldier lift his weapon to begin firing. After which I pulled my second gun. I had a perfect shot. Down in the shade I turned, lifted my arms and fired several times up at the Winter Soldier and hit him. I hit him several times. I hit him enough that he turned and dover for cover up on the bridge.

Unsure if it was a fatal shot, I ran for cover along side of a work truck.

He did have a considerable amount of body armor on.

Still though, I waited and watched him pop back up, minus his protective eyewear, then angrily fire downward where I had been standing.

I returned fire only to be fired upon in return.

He couldn't see me so he unleashed a torrent of bullets my way not caring about anyone else. Someone else began to fire in my general direction. That was around the time I hopped up on the sidewalk so they'd see me, so they'd shoot at me and hopefully miss the fleeing people all around.

How hard was it to miss a redhead? I didn't even zigzag to make it that much easier for them.

When I looked back I saw him look for a way down.

So he'd be joining me soon.

I ran a little further then hid behind a parked car to watch him jump off the overpass as if it were nothing, then slowly, almost casually, come looking for me.

Fighting him one on one was a death wish.

I'd have to fight smarter.

In the limited time I had, I quickly set up my phone and hid it with a prerecorded message for times such as these. Because clearly my life was somewhat problematic. After that I went around to the other side of the street to wait, watch and prepare to attack him.

Since I didn't have my suit, or time to raid the armory in Shield, I was left with few weapons.

As I watched him slowly, methodically get closer, I dug a garrote from my boot and waited.

Contrary to popular belief, the waiting was not interminable. I could have waited forever to further plan and strategize.

I watched my recording get his attention and him roll an explosive under a car, which was my cue.

I waited and watched him raise his weapon in preparation to shoot me. Once that explosive went off I jumped up on a car, knowing it was the perfect distraction and nothing better would come my way.

My movement must have caught his attention, but was too late.

I was already in the air. With one leg I kicked his gun away, used my momentum to swing myself around, onto his shoulders and had my garrote out. The bastard pulled his hand up in the last possible second, so my thin wire didn't quite slide home. I still pulled hard and did my best to strangle him, get him off balance, distract him, find another opening for a fatal shot.

Right until he backed into a car.

His metal arm reached up and sank into my shoulder…and then I was airborne.

Both my hands shot out to brace for impact, as a car came closer at an alarming speed. Which I sort of bounced off and onto the hard pavement with a solid thud.

Not a second later I heard him go for his weapon.

I was quicker and flung one of my round magnetic tasers at him before he could get both hands on his gun. Watching that metal arm go rigid was such a relief.

It gave me time to get up, run and regroup.

There had to be a safer place I could lead him. Now that he had his gun there had to be a better place to get him.

As I ran and kept my eyes peeled, I yelled at people to get out of the way. I yelled it at everyone, over and over.

I'd made it maybe twenty…twenty-five yards, yelling the whole way in the hopes people would clear out.

I heard the gunshot. Around the same time a glass window of a nearby car exploded and then came the distinctive impact of a bullet as it ripped into me.

The impact knocked my down to my knees. Fire burnt through me when the bullet went through my shoulder and out into a nearby car. Oh my was there pain, was there shock and confusion.

He shot me. He shot me again. He shot me through a car.

Instinctively my hand went to the pain high on my chest. I stumbled around for a safe place, for cover, for just a second to catch my breath before he shot me again.

My senses were beyond heightened.

Bullets entering and exiting my body did that and suddenly, it felt quiet. Suddenly there didn't seem to be a soul around. It was still. My eyes darted around looking for him, listening for him. He had to be close, he wouldn't pass up a chance like this because I knew I wouldn't have either.

A noise from behind got my attention.

Behind and over my shoulder somehow, I turned, looked and saw him. I watched him raise his gun and knew he had me.

He was going to kill me.

He was above me on a car. He had the perfect shot to complete his mission and end my life.

A moment passed and he turned, he looked to the side, something else seeming to have gotten his attention.

It was Steve.

Whom I'd totally forgotten about in that moment.

It was Steve. I wasn't going to die. Not yet anyway.

I watched him turn to face Steve and it only got worse.

Watching them fight was terrifying.

If it were possible, they were equals, they were so evenly matched.

One would have the upper hand and then the other, and then the other and the other. They went through their weapons one by one. They fought one another viciously, doing their absolute best to kill each. Which told me someone was going to have to do something.

I couldn't help Steve out by joining the fight.

The Winter Soldier would just paint the street with more of my blood.

But he did drop his gun, both of them, to include the one with the grenades.

As fast as anyone could coming down off a major adrenaline high and with a hole in their chest, I made my way over to the gun, grabbed it. I took note of Sam's arrival to the party and just as the Winter Soldier raised his gun, I fired a grenade at him.

Unfortunately I was in no condition to savor the moment.

And then we got arrested.


	25. Chapter 25

We were going to die.

Hydra caught us.

They were going to kill us and toss us in a shallow grave.

I knew for a fact.

I was our trio's resident expert on coups.

It was just how it worked.

Hydra wasn't taking any chances with the three of us. Two guards were in the back of a blacked out van with us. Sam and I were handcuffed on one side, Steve was shackled to the wall with the heavy duty irons and braces.

The two guards in the van had the new shock sticks with twice the voltage. Rumlow had used one on Steve when we were packed into the van.

Rumow didn't seem at all shocked to see me.

I made sure the look I sent him conveyed the fact I really wanted to set him on fire.

After that I rested my head against the hard steel of the van and focused on my breathing. I focused on keeping my heartrate low to try and keep as much blood as possible in my body.

I mean, I was ninety-eight percent positive we were going to be murdered. But I wasn't about to let them see me as anything other than calm when it happened.

The ride wasn't exactly smooth either.

Based on time, turns and terrain I was willing to say they were taking us to a industrial part of the city near the river. It was what I would have done.

Getting shocked and manhandled hadn't taken the shock from Steve. Across from us he spoke openly, not seeming to care if anyone heard. He looked utterly destroyed. I could have pushed him over with my pinky if circumstances were different.

"It was him. He looked right at me like he didn't even know me."

Not so much as a movement from our guards.

We were so going to die.

Sam on the other hand was agitated, "How's that even possible? It was like seventy years ago."

My gaze went over to Steve.

Metal handcuffs tightly on my wrist paired with restraints kept me on the other side of the van.

In that same stunned, bewildered, shattered voice he told Sam. "Zola…Bucky's whole unit was captured in forty-three. Zola experimented on him. Whatever he did helped Bucky survive the fall. They must have found him and…"

A bump made me sway, warm blood gushed down my chest and back leading me to close my eyes, work on my breathing, internal calming. I couldn't touch him, hold him or do anything more than try to make it a little better. "None of that's your fault Steve."

"Even when I had nothing, I had Bucky."

The back of my head hit the wall of the van.

He didn't deserve this. Sam didn't deserve this. I probably deserved a little bit of it.

And I was almost positive the Winter Soldier was still alive.

Sam's voice filled the van, "We need to get a doctor in here. If we don't put pressure on that wound she's gonna bleed out here in the truck."

The zapping noise made me open my eyes and turn my head to see one of the guards brandish that taser stick at Sam.

That guard then jammed it into the other guard and then kicked them, knocking their unconscious self on the floor.

Well, that was new.

My attention was piqued.

One of my eyebrows rose.

As the guard pulled their blacked out full face helmet up and off, we were greeted to the sight of the always lovely Maria Hill. She winced, hair stuck in the helmet. "Ah…that thing was squeezing my brain." After a breath she looked between the three of us, gaze settling on Sam. "Who's this guy?"

She always did know how to make an entrance.

"This is Sam," I told her, doing my best to remain calm as our ride hit a pothole the size of Delaware. More blood gushed out of me.

Quick on her feet with all of her blood inside her body, Maria was up and had Sam's handcuffs open and the restraints holding him to the wall unlocked pretty quick. "Hi Sam. Hold this…" she requested good naturedly upon handing him the taser, "…give him a little zap if he moves."

My eyes dropped down to the tactically geared up dude who wasn't moving.

If it were up to me, I would have given him another little prod for God and Country. Sam however seemed to have a good head on his shoulders.

As Maria quickly had the little key in my handcuffs, my eyes wandered from her soft brown ones to the blue ones that watched me across the van closely.

"Is it just the one?"

Her voice made me look back at her, "Yeah. It went through me."

"Of course it did. I told you to get some of that new lightweight bodyarmor. Barton has it."

Her hands were fast and sure as she went for the straps holding me to the seat.

I couldn't even begin to hide my annoyance, "I know…I know. Next time I'm at the office I'll pick some up."

She gave me a knowing smile then put a hand on my shoulder to steady me when the restraints were no longer holding me up. I'm not going to lie, I was grateful. It took a second for me to get my bearings. Not from blood loss, but the blood that had gotten on my seat was slippery.

"Grab the keys on his belt Sam. I need both sets to get Roger's free."

Oh goody, maybe I would get a chance to tase the guard.


	26. Chapter 26

Fury was alive.

Don't get me wrong, I was thrilled to see him. But it hurt. It may have hurt more than I expected. Likely due to his personal doctor shoving a clotting agent into both sides of my gunshot wound, but I was no expert.

I was beginning to understand Steve's frustration with us. With all of the deception and underhanded tactics on what could only be described as a professional level.

Seeing Nick Fury alive and kicking, in a hospital bed and hooked up to medical equipment in an old cave bunker in Virginia really made you take stock of things.

That and the painkillers I refused. Mostly because I knew that tomorrow would be the big party and I needed all my faculties.

I also needed as much blood in my body as humanly possible.

So I didn't complain.

I listened with Steve and Sam and Maria as Fury told us how he got away and realized that not one, or two, but three people in my life had survived the Winter Soldier not counting me.

That was promising.

Compared to a couple days ago when the Winter Soldier was my greatest failure, things were looking downright optimistic. I mean, I wasn't about to go skipping down the dark corridors of the cave complex. But I was no longer totally convinced that we might all die before the weekend.

When Fury tried to sit up in his hospital bed, the doctor who'd been treating me got up. Immediately I glanced down at the hole. It smelled pretty bad. I wasn't about to touch it either. But the flow of blood seemed to stop. One could not ask for me.

Right before Maria went to go help the doctor keep Fury in his hospital bed, I glanced up at her, "Is there a bathroom I can freshen up in? I wanna get some of this blood off me."

Immediately she and Sam told me not to get the wound wet, which I already knew.

This was not my first rodeo.

Maria gave me directions that sounded sketchy to me. But we were in a underground bunker type thing so that was hardly a shocker.

I only got lost twice.

Still I couldn't complain, two hours ago I was convinced that I was about to be murdered. So this was progress even if it was dark and dank.

The bathroom wasn't too bad either.

There was a shower and toilet and sink with a mirror on the wall. It was spartan but immaculately clean. I could have eaten dinner off that spotless floor. I felt a little bad. I was about to get blood everywhere.

Already I'd left a few smears on the door knob and slide lock further up. There was a small table in the corner that had cleaning supplies, paper towels, a few clean towels and a vanilla candle.

I did eye the bleach and Windex but decided against it.

I considered the cloth bath towels and decided not to be mean.

Instead I pulled my undershirt up and tossed it into the sink. It landed with a resounding wet noise that made me grimace. A handful of paper towels were shoved under the faucet which had water as cold as ice. It was not a great feeling, but after a few hearty scrubs and squeezing out the reddish water, I did manage to get most my blood from the front of me.

My bra was ruined though, there was no saving it.

A tapping on the door got my attention as I dabbed quite gently around the exit wound on my chest.

Maybe if I soaked my bra in peroxide?

I ignored that repetitive tapping.

I hadn't yet figured out how to clean the blood off my back.

That knocking started again and I frowned at the door. Up until Steve's voice came through, "Nat? Open the door."

Oh, well, if it was him.

Without thinking, I leaned back and flipped the slide lock.

No sooner had that happened did the door quickly open and he hurry in, close the door and slid the lock shut.

Before I could even ask him if Fury had to be sedated, how he was doing, what Sam thought of everything or if he would be willing to sponge the blood from my back, he grabbed my face and kissed me.

His hands were desperate and greedy, answering my concern as to how he was doing.

I didn't even know how it happened.

My wad of paper towels dropped to the floor as I grabbed him. My hands gripped his jacket and t-shirt underneath. I kissed him back just as hungrily. Something was different that I couldn't put my finger on. Something felt different.

I pushed at his jacket and he shook it off onto the floor. I pulled on his soft t-shirt and he pulled it off over his head, tossing that aside too.

His fingers combed through my hair. He kissed my cheek and nose and forehead before looking at the hole on my chest as a gasp came from my lips. Oh he felt good touching me and holding me, kissing me. My eyes closed as a feeling of falling swept through me.

My fingers began to dig at his belt.

"I don't have a condom." He paused, whispering against my lips. His fingers woven into my hair tightened.

I didn't care.

My fingers did not slow in their haste to unbuckle his belt. "It's ok. I have something else instead."

If he had any hesitation or second thoughts they didn't show. He kissed me again. He pushed me backwards gentler than last time. His tongue brushed mine, the backs of my thighs pressed against that table of cleaning supplies. My head spun, his belt became unbuckled and I yanked on the last layer, his undershirt. Every was happening so quickly yet not fast enough.

We were alive. We hadn't died.

There was nothing more I wanted in that moment than him.

When he yanked off his undershirt I reevaluated that very thought. My eyes roamed over the expanse of him, followed by my hands. My fingers softly touched bruises that had already darkened on their way to healing along his muscular side.

A thought came that I should maybe say something to him. His childhood friend who had helped him bury his mother, protect him from bullies and fought in the war with him was alive. Also possibly experimented on by the enemy, was the Winter Soldier and had tried to murder all of us. But I didn't want to talk about it since his friend had shot me, twice. I needed something else from him and from the way he touched me, he did too. Sometimes there was just no need for words.

What I did ask him was nothing too personal. "Why do you have so many clothes on?"

In response he grabbed me by my pants and deposited me up on that table. A couple bottles of cleaner got knocked aside, the candle wound up on the floor and those industrial grade paper towels with the consistency of drywall went everywhere.

A random mutinous thought rose up from the primordial ooze for just a second. It reminded me that this was a mistake and went against all my training.

This was pointless.

This was not for a mission or to gather information, this served my purpose in no way. Sex for gratification or recreation was a waste of time and energy. Being exciting and comforted, or for enjoyment was pointless.

But that wasn't me anymore.

As forcefully as I could, I banished that thought and pulled Steve closer. My leg hooked around his waist and if it were possible I became more desperate for him.

I wanted him because it felt good and he made me feel better than I'd ever felt and I wanted him to feel the same. I wanted to give and get that touch and comfort. I couldn't begin to explain it. On a more base level, I understood it. Which was probably why those old thoughts had drifted to the surface.

The feeling of his fingers struggle with my pants both distracted me and comforted me.

Before he could break the hooks, I let go of him to unfasten them, secure with the knowledge that he needed the exact same thing as me.


	27. Chapter 27

An hour or so must have passed before either Fury won, or his doctors gave up. Because I found myself trying to sit comfortably in the world's most uncomfortable chair. All while listening to he and Steve argue over whether to sort of partially dismantle Shield, or just burn the whole thing to the ground.

I personally did not care either way at that point.

Granted I was leaning towards Steve's 'burn it to the ground' plan since Hydra almost managed to kill me several times that week already. Not even counting the times in the past they may have tried to kill me. Of which I was giving a lot of extra thought, mind you. There were a couple times I had a weird feeling about, but never really considered it being more than bad luck, or a close call.

I couldn't help but now take that a little personal.

Almost dying due to my bad behavior was one thing, but being offed by my employer after going straight was another thing entirely. On the other hand, I could understand Fury's resistance. It was his life's work after all and a good part of mine as well.

But in the end I had to go with Steve.

Mostly because Hydra was the reason I felt like the walking dead. I couldn't even get comfortable enough to argue with them. My back was still sticky from my own blood and every time I fidgeted I seemed to get a whiff of that distinctive iron smell. My chest was becoming more and more uncomfortable. And I suspected the Tylenol I took was not going to make a huge amount of difference. My entire body felt like I'd been chased around DC, in a car accident and bounced off cars and pavement by the Winter Soldier.

I found myself peeking down at the white cotton while Maria and Fury, Steve and Sam continued to debate.

The white bandage covered most my exposed collarbone and back on the other side.

Twice Sam nudged me when I began to peel an edge back to take a peek.

Both times I swatted at him.

I knew what I was doing, this wasn't my first gunshot wound and the bullet didn't even hit anything important.

Sam seemed totally onboard with Steve's total destruction plan.

Well, up until Fury began discussing strategy with Steve and Maria. I wasn't much of a planner, so I just listened. Half my work was planned and the other half seemed to be improvised in the field, on a moment by moment basis. Besides I was busy digging another piece of glass of my hair.

"What do you mean Natasha's going too? She's been shot."

No one else seemed as shocked as Sam.

I was busy picking at that hunk of glass.

"She'll be with me," Fury told Sam, as if that made everything better.

Clearly unable to even, Sam glanced over my head at Steve, who'd also decided not to take at seat at the table. A wise choice. These chairs seemed to have been a leftover from the Atomic Bunker age, or maybe even the Inquisition.

"Natasha will be fine," Maria assured Sam from where she sat. She was clearly more comfortable in her chair. Had she got a better chair? "This is hardly a flesh wound for her…ask her about the time she was arrested for piracy in Canada. She was in the hospital for two weeks cause of the Mounties."

That made me smile.

I guess not all my memories of Shield were tainted negatively.

"Really," Sam didn't even try to hide his disapproval when he looked at me. "The Mounties?"

"They started it," I clapped right back upon finally digging out that piece of glass caught up in my hair.

"She'll be with Fury," Maria assured Sam. Which really didn't help him feel any more comfortable about the plan to bring down Hydra and Shield. Sam looked from the even more injured Fury, to me as I checked the time on Steve's watch and then began to difficult process of sitting up. His dark eyes locked onto Steve's as if to ask if he could believe this nonsense Fury was sprouting. I couldn't say I didn't blame him. Our plan to bring down Director Pierce, Hydra and three helicarriers with five people, two of whom were mildly to seriously injured, was not the best.

I'd already been given my mission details.

Once I was finally in a seated position, I pushed myself up into a standing position and addressed Sam, "Gentlemen…since I've already been briefed on my duties tomorrow, I'm going to go find someplace and take an eight hour nap, then prep."

Sam's eyebrows rose.

I grabbed the laptop that Maria had given me and patted his shoulder. "I'll see you later or tomorrow. It'll all be fine."

Fury gave me a pointed look at the laptop and when I looked over to Steve, I parted with what I hoped were words he'd take to heart. "Don't do anything I would do."

No wiser words could have ever been given.

I never got to bid Maria a fond pre-nap farewell.

The brunette just pointed at the wall behind her, "That's for you to wear tomorrow. Make sure everything fits and works. If there are any connectivity issues, I want to work them out here."

Sam was so never going to hang out with us again.

**Nine hours later…**

The knob on the door to the small room I'd occupied turned. Slowly it twisted and from the old bunker bed I'd commandeered and shoved into the corner, I watched in what could only be described as mild curiosity.

Lets face it, I wasn't getting up for anything short of the Winter Soldier.

After what seemed like forever I was finally almost a little comfortable.

A laptop belonging to one of the doctors rested on my stomach, allowing me to watch endless content on Councilwoman Hawley. Allowing me to get a good look at the way she moved, held herself and spoke.

When the door cracked open and Steve slid in, I wouldn't say I was shocked.

"You steal your uniform back already?"

"Borrowed," he immediately corrected, shutting the door as quietly as possible.

I decided not to tell him that taking anything out of a Smithsonian was stealing. I had enough on my mind. My eyes almost went back to the laptop screen when I noticed he slid the lock on the old rusty metal door.

I didn't move from where I was splayed out on the bed, but he had my attention.

My fingers went up to pause the video I'd been watching of the Councilwoman giving a speech in Belgium.

I watched him kick off his shoes and shed his blue jacket that had seen considerably better days with moderate interest.

"What's Sam up to?"

"Sleeping," he told me, broad back still to me while he looked for a spot to put his filthy, dirty and bloody jacket.

I couldn't help but smile. If I had more time I would have been sleeping too. "That's a true combat vet for you. A man after my own heart if there ever was one."

He laughed incredibly softly but I still heard it.

His eyes glanced up at the blue skirt suit hanging up on the stone wall that I'd be sliding into in a few hours. He traced his fingers over the skirt for a second before turning around to look around the tiny supply room. Or perhaps even a big closet that I'd hunkered into.

I watched him walk my way and did my best to shimmy over, to give him a little piece of mattress to sit on. Since I'd refused painkillers I could feel the fiery protest in my chest.

Without any real hesitation he plopped down and took up more space than I'd given. Ending up with his thigh pressed against my side on the well-worn mattress. He gestured at my shirt while hooking a finger in the neck of his and pulled it to the side.

So he wanted to see if I'd left my wound alone.

I reached up and pulled the V of the grey t-shirt I'd been given by one of the doctors to the side. Thus exposing the bandage that had earlier been taped down to my chest.

His eyes were on me but his mind was somewhere else.

It didn't take a mind reader to know what he was thinking. "The mind is a powerful thing Rogers. I'm sure on some level…somewhere deep, he remembers you."

His eyes met mine.

There was something in them that told me he wanted me to say more.

"I have memories that are real and memories that aren't real," I quietly told him as he tugged the soft cotton t-shirt back over my bandage. "I have memories that I am convinced are real. But I know they are not because things don't line up with what I know to be true."

He was still listening, his attention was solely focused on me.

"Even if he's being manipulated by Hydra and he's not in control of his choices, or his thoughts…memories cannot just be erased. You were frozen solid for over fifty years and you have your memories. His memories are there somewhere, buried deep."

His gaze was pensive.

His eyes narrowed in thought.

"You think so?"

I was almost positive.

Telling him something along the lines of him being unforgettable wasn't going to cut it. Or bringing up everything the two men had shared was too close to a stroll down memory lane, when his mind should have been focused elsewhere. So I went with common sense. I was no expert on the brain, but I had been in the field since I was a teenager.

I patted the bed beside me. "You can't pick out memories you want someone to have. His memories of the past can't be wiped away, only to retain what his handlers want him to know…it doesn't work like that. The brain isn't remote controlled."

That seemed to hit the right note because Steve nodded slightly, still thinking but he also turned and stretched out on the small bed beside me.

It wasn't even remotely comfortable.

I had to wiggle until I made myself not uncomfortable. Both of my legs flung over his and I made him fold his arm behind his head so I could have most of the thin pillow. Still, every now and then, I was convinced he'd fallen asleep watching the Councilwoman speak.

But then he'd move, stretch or start to run his fingers through my hair.

After about twenty minutes of watching her he began to point out little mannerisms he picked up from observing the videos. Which was probably the closest he was going to get to rest before morning.


	28. Chapter 28

"We need a plan."

I looked over at Steve from exactly three small steps away in that tiny bunker room. If we could even call it that. I was borderline on the fence about calling it a pantry by that point. Slightly bewildered, I frowned and worked on dismantling the dark blue skirt suit from it's hanger clips. "We have a plan Roger's."

Making no move to get off then bed that he so easily filled up, Steve sighed. His eyes were focused somewhere up on the stone ceiling. "No, another plan…for after the plan. You're something of a flight risk and we don't exactly have apartments anymore."

A smile curled over my lips before I could stop myself.

That was the first time anyone had ever referred to me as a flight risk in an endearing sort of way.

I sent some side-eye his way. I then shook out the sleeveless silk blouse that perfectly matched the skirt and blazer. "How about you put some pants on before Maria catches up to me?"

I had about forty minutes before I had to leave and heard her shouting for me every once in a while. Which was what had finally spurred me off that thing I was calling a bed. He still had a few hours before he left with Sam and Maria.

"You don't have to worry." I then assured him, "I'll catch up to wherever you and Sam are going, hiding or incarcerated after today. Sam promised to take me hang-gliding. I'm not about to miss out on that."

At mention of incarceration he sent me a sharp look, but he sat up and after looking around for a moment, grabbed his khaki pants from off the cool stone floor.

Knowing me well, Maria had given me a skirt suit that I would be able to move around in. The blouse had a high neck to hide my latest battle wound and there was a wig I'd pull on last.

"We should still have some sort of a plan for the future. In situations like this, when it'll be harder to sneak off around people we know without them getting suspicious." He explained, clearly having given this some forethought.

Not even the least bit subtle. I glanced over my shoulder to watch him sit up and pull his pants on, then stand up and adjust himself as he pulled them up.

"Agreed," was all I had to contribute at that time.

He caught me looking.

I didn't look away, I did however raise my eyebrows in response just to see what he'd do. Because I clearly hadn't wasted enough time messing around with him that early morning.

In response he zipped up his pants then came my way in a single step, looking far too delicious than anyone should have so early in the morning.

With incredibly skilled hands, he helped me pull off the big white bandage. In a joint effort he put a big regular one on that would lie smoother against my chest and not be bulky under the silk undershirt. Steve also helped me slide the soft blouse over my head and button the back.

"Thai food," was what came out of my mouth.

His eyebrows met as he lifted my hair from beneath the high neckline of the blouse.

"We'll swing by that Thai place I like at dinner first chance we can after today. When its safe. If one of us has to leave DC, then we'll leave a note with the hostess. That can be our thing in the future…assuming we live. We'll pick out a restaurant and that'll be our meetup place. Normal people eat. It's not suspicious."

"That works," he agreed.

After which I reached for the skirt and began to step in it.

Since Maria knew my size it slid up my hips with ease.

Both of our hands slid the skirt up and adjusted the blouse, so it lay flat beneath it. With a gentleness that betrayed the size of him, he zipped it up on the side with one smooth swift motion of his hands.

"You have to promise me you won't take off today."

I smirked at him.

I couldn't help it.

I also reached out to take the front of his pants in my hands and do the button. It may have taken me a smidge longer than needed, I may have taken a moment to enjoy the warm feel of his skin against the backs of my fingers. "I promise," was what I told him while grabbing both ends of his belt. With a few quick motions I had it buckled and tucked into the belt loops. "You have to promise me you won't do anything reckless." His mouth moved and I silenced him with a look, "You know what I'm talking about. You and Sam will be busy enough with those Helicarriers and smoking out Hydra from the Shield agents. Sam and I can help you after today. We're stronger together."

There was no need to say Bucky's name, it was just implied. There was no other person, place or thing I could have been talking about. My fingers then wrapped around his belt so I could pull him closer and I did. "I mean it."

He humored me and stepped closer. His fingers touched my face. "I promise I'll be good. Honestly Nat, between you and me, you're the one more likely to go sniffing out trouble."

Well he wasn't wrong.

I still didn't believe him for a second. Not because he was so obviously lying like at the hospital the night Fury was shot in his apartment. But because there was guilt in his eyes. People did crazy things when weighed down with guilt.

I sincerely hoped Sam would be able to keep a close eye on him.

"Fury will be with me. My sniffing out of trouble will be limited to however fast he can follow me around."

If it could even be said, we both eyed each other warily.

"So I'll see you tonight at the Thai place? If not tonight then tomorrow, or the next night, whenever it's safe? Unless you leave me a note with further instructions?"

The mere thought of leaving him a note with further instructions made my lip twitch in a smirk. I could put more thought into that later. "It's a date."


	29. Chapter 29

**Later that afternoon…**

"Oh god…oh god, oh god…"

Those words came out of me like a little mantra, beneath my breath as Sam and I ran across the rocky bank of the Potomac to where we'd spotted Steve.

Fury hadn't even had a chance to land the helicopter before we'd hopped out.

I did something painful to my ankle when I landed in the shallow water on a not sturdy surface. Not that I cared. Both Sam and I had seen the blood from the air when we were looking for him in the river. We'd been looking for an hour. With every minute that passed, I grew more and more terrified that only divers would find him in the wreckage of one of the helicarriers that was in the large river.

Sam had a First Aid Kit under his arm and stood for a second, slowly looking over Steve's unmoving body.

I dropped down to my knees beside him and immediately placed a hand on his warm face. He was still alive. Dead bodies weren't warm. My hand went to his chest where I rested my ear. A distinct sound of him breathing relieved me. When his chest moved beneath my ear, I felt something break inside of me in gratitude.

"He's breathing," I told Sam.

"He's been shot," Sam told me as he slowly knelt down.

Without thinking I dug my hands under Steve's arm and lifted, my first thought was to roll him over to get any water out of his lungs. In doing so I patted his arm. "Steve…Steve…it's Sam and me."

There was no response.

No noise, no movement, not even a small cough up of a little water.

Oh my god, he was going to die.

My eyes immediately went up to Sam who seemed to be in his element. "We need to get him in the helicopter and to a hospital." He looked him over then moved so he was up by his head, "Grab him beneath his knees. We'll carry him together. He's heavy so watch your step on the rocks."

My head whipped around to see if Fury had found a spot to land and indeed he had, up further on the river bank in an area that was clear of trees.

Sam tossed the kit on Steve's stomach as I made my way down to his legs. Listening to Sam, I got between them and got a good grip underneath Steve's knees. Sam was right. Steve was heavy.

It took the both of us to lift him.

Had he always been that heavy? He didn't feel that heavy.

Being down between his legs with his knees in my hands allowed me to see all the blood on him, the swelling on his face and the bruises. He hadn't listened. He hadn't been good. If he lived he was never going to hear the end of this from me.

The thought of losing him hit me hard. It took my breath away. I felt like I was going to be physically sick from the fear.

I hadn't realized I'd grown so attached to the man.

Sam grunted as we carried Steve across the river bank. "Nat…do you happen to know his blood type? Off the top of you head?"

I almost dropped him then and there.

"Can Steve get blood? With the serum in him?"

Even struggling beneath the weight of Steve's torso Sam frowned at me. "You may need to call one of your Avenger genius friends to ask."


	30. Chapter 30

**Three days later…**

"How'd it go?"

Over the past three days I'd managed to miss Steve between surgeries, visits to Radiology or when he was sleeping. So when I stepped into his room late that afternoon, I was beyond thrilled to see he was both there, conscious and arguing with Sam over marshmallows.

I couldn't begin to explain how the male mind worked.

With my hip I shut the hospital door to Steve's private room and turned to face them both.

Sam winced, "That great huh?"

My visit to the hospital was my first stop after the committee hearing.

With a sigh I hadn't realized had been in me, I ran my fingers through my hair and strolled into the room with both their eyes watching me. "I'm not under arrest. So that's a plus."

The concern on Steve's face was tangible.

Sam had words for me. "You gonna be ok staying in DC? Or you gonna bounce? I have some family in Virginia you could crash with till things calm down."

The smile that I gave Sam was genuine. I was touched. I had big plans to stay with Clint and Laura for a week next to get my proverbial act together and set up my new life and identity. Until then though, I needed some private time with Steve. "I'll probably crash in your guest room again. But I'll keep the Virginia option open."

My eyes settled on Steve, "When are they cutting you loose?"

He actually frowned at me.

Sam was all settled into the chair right by the bedside. So I plopped down in one at the foot of Steve's hospital bed.

"Tell her what you did man," Sam pointedly told Steve, crossing his arms and making _that_ face.

Needless to say my curiosity was piqued.

I crossed my arms and cocked my head and looked right at Steve's now lightly bruised face.

"He tried to climb out the window," Sam told me.

Steve looked right at his friend with what could only be described as righteous outrage.

"Captain Steven Rogers!"

Those words came out of my mouth before I could stop myself and ended up with Sam given Steve a 'told you so' look. Steve actually looked a little surprised at my outburst.

Sam then looked at me, "Is that Korean nurse out there still?"

With my eyes dangerously focused on Steve, I inquired, "In the purple scrubs with a braid in her hair? Yeah."

To which Sam stood up pretty quickly from his chair. "I'll go see if she's heard from the doctor."

Yeah I bet.

My narrowed gaze was for Steve only.

"Make sure he stays in that bed. If the doctor catches him trying to climb down the side of the building again...he won't be going home anytime soon."  
I didn't even wait until Sam was out of the hospital room to go flirt up a storm with the nurse. "Seriously Steve?"

"I never ever made it past…" Steve began of which I would have none of it.

"You promised to be good! This is not good behavior! You're supposed to be recovering!"

He looked pretty much recovered to me but I was no doctor.

A hostile look usually reserved for Stark was sent at the door to his room that closed behind Sam.

"Don't make that face! Sam and I were the ones to carry your limp, wet, bullet filled body to the helicopter. I thought you were dead and I was going to have to find a new friend."

That earned me a look that could have melted the iciest of hearts.

When he pushed himself into a upright and seated position, it took all of my self control to remain in the chair and not go hop up on the hospital bed with him. The look I rewarded him with warned him to stay where he was or else. It made him to sigh loudly in frustration and sag back into the hospital bed. There was enough weight to him that it shook said bed.

Finally he managed to speak, totally unable to mask his frustration. "Sam told me you kept coming by and missing me, or I was sleeping."

In that moment I was so glad that I had practiced restraint.

The door to Steve's room opened and in came three doctors, a nurse and by the looks of those suits, a hospital administrator and lawyer.

Not that I was about to quiet down. "My timing is impeccable as always Roger's. Plus at least when you were sleeping I knew you could only get yourself in limited amounts trouble."

He didn't even seem to care about the full entourage in his room. "You know what Romanoff…"

I cocked my head to the side and waited.

I wanted to know what.

I was ready for it.

But those eyes of his glanced over at the door.

I could take a hint and stood up smoothly from the hospital chair.

"Where are you going?"

Clearly my reputation preceded me. Those doctors and especially the lawyer were looking at me as if they expected me to jump on Steve and kill him. It put a smile on my face as I fluffed my hair. "Eh…I'll go see how Sam's luck is going. If he's got a date, I have his house to myself so I'll do some show shopping, eat some Thai and then go crash on his couch again. Try not to crawl out too many more windows. You're too old to be bouncing off the sidewalk these days."

The look on his face alone told me I was going to get it next time we were alone.

What came out of his mouth was meant solely for show in front his medical team. "Keep it up. I'll tell Tony you were the one who spilled that mango smoothie in his new car and blamed Banner. I'm still getting emails about it."

It was actually Clint who spilled the smoothie and blamed Banner, but I couldn't help but smirk. He was coming along quite nicely. I'd have him swearing up a storm in no time.


	31. Chapter 31

**Later that night…**

"I can't believe you started eating without me."

The look I gave Steve was a bewildered one. Seated up on Sam's kitchen counter, I could not help but feel high and mighty, as well as hungry. I hadn't eaten since the granola bar I'd shoved in my mouth before the committee. God was that painful. I'd rather get shot than do that again. "I can't believe you can't believe it. How was I supposed to know you'd be set free from the hospital with enough time to get across town? I could have gone hungry waiting on DC traffic."

While heartily digging into the takeout container of curry, I watched Steve lock the door behind him and kick off his shoes.

Sam had scored a date with the Korean nurse and even I had to high five him. Not only because I heard her telling him the naughtiest joke I'd heard in months, quite possibly years, but because that meant I got his TV all to myself for the night.

Sam wouldn't be back that night, probably the following morning but maybe the coming afternoon.

I'd wished him the best of luck, told him to stay hydrated and not to do anything I would do at first, which were the wisest words I could pass on.

"Did you get my noodles?"

Of course I got his noodles.

With my foot, I gestured at the paper bag on a nearby counter top.

He bee-lined for the paper bag and when it was safe to speak, I inquired, "The hospital knows you've left? Right? If I turn the news on your face won't be plastered all over as some sort of escaped patient?"

Steve didn't even look up as he dug through the remaining contents of my take-out order. "I was discharged this time…oh good, you got the sticky rice."

"And extra mango for you so you don't eat it all this time," I shot back before grabbing a box of rice and dumping a sufficient amount of it into my curry. While doing so, I watched him grab a few chopsticks from the sack too. Which he had mastered after watching me a handful of times.

I watched him glance over at the kitchen table, where he most likely was wanting to go take a seat, being that traditional soul.

Instead, he dug the bamboo sticks into his takeout box and leaned against a counter within reach of my toes.

"Clint brought me flowers…" Steve told me right before he dug into his first container. I hoped I didn't stiffen. "…and Bengay." He added between bites with a bit of bewilderment that made me grin despite myself. "Then he thanked me for blowing up the office not on a weekend."

That was so Clint, my smirk grew into a smile while he shoveled Pad Thai in.

Tomorrow afternoon I'd go with Clint back to his farm to unwind, regroup, gather the things I had hidden there and to clear my head. I wanted to see Laura. I wanted to sleep with the windows open and not have to worry about anything coming in except for fireflies.

"He's here to pick you up?"

My eyes lifted from the contents of my dinner, to his, which completely captured mine. I wasn't about to spill any of Clint's secrets. As they weren't my secrets to tell.

"Tomorrow…" I began while mixing up my rice and curry a bit more. "…at Fury's funeral, in public, I'll come up with something basic. But yeah. He's here to pick me up. I have a few things hidden around here and there. Clint knows a few guys that can help put a few things together for me. You know…so I can go straight as they say in the streets."

His eyebrows went up. "And then what?"

And then what?

"Shopping mostly. And then I need to keep an eye on these two boys I know. The two of them cannot seem to stay out of trouble. You would be shocked and appalled to hear what the bigger of the two was up to this week."

Steve gave me a look that reeked of disapproval.

"It's kind of hard to make plans. Have you and Sam figured out where you'll start your hunt for Bucky? It's not like we live lives conducent to buying a condo and settling into a nine to five."

That seemed to hit close to home for him. He was quiet for a minute. Just long enough to almost finish his noodles and point at me with his chopsticks. "I'll have a better idea tomorrow. This red head that helped me blow up the office is getting me all the information she can find."

I was about to argue until I realized he had a point. We both blew it up in two different but efficient ways.

"That's really going to look bad on our resumes," I muttered while gathering the perfect amount of curry on my fork. It seemed he had found the rogue pair of chopsticks floating around the paper sack. With the utensil stuck between my lips, I reached behind me and tossed a small burner phone in his general direction. I'd picked it up on my way to the Thai place. Almost effortlessly he snatched it out of the air then looked it over.

"That's for you Soldier."

Steve frowned at me and I could totally understand.

More technology. And after he had mastered his other cell phone. I was clearly the worst.

"If you absolutely have to get in touch with me before I catch up to you two."

I only planned to be gone a week or two tops, but my ability to track down chaos and mayhem seemed to be rubbing off on him.

"While I'm gone I'd suggest you two do some constructive things too. Look into mercenary groups or submit applications at Stark Industries, invest some of your Army back pay, maybe go out with cute blonde that was spying on you." He gave me a heated look at that last bit which made me go on. "I mean really Steve, you can skip the first date entirely. If she spent a year or two spying on you…the proverbial ice is broken. The awkward part is over."

He put his takeout container down, that I noticed was empty, before coming my way. "There's this red head that makes me crazy. I promised to take her to dinner. If I play my cards right, she might just stick around."

I had to put down my own almost empty container to curl my finger at him in the universal come closer gesture. Thus rewarding him with my complete attention.

He came closer and I rested my palms on the counter, so I could lean down and wrap my legs around his waist. "I never told you to marry her Rogers. A nice normal date with a nice normal girl won't kill you while I'm away."

His head cocked to the side and he lifted an eyebrow.

I leaned down closer. "Besides, I'm positive that I've won over Little Steve from Brooklyn. He and I have a special connection. He'll keep you in line."

Both of his eyebrows went up.

"Not everyone understands what it's like to be born full of _Fight Me_…" to which I lifted my hands so I could make finger quotes just for him. The expression on his face, just for me, was worth it. "...And not have the tools or power to make that magic happen. So the little guy and I have connected. I guess I'll just have to work with this whole specimen thing…" which earned its own gesture. My fingers drew out a heart in kind of the way the Apple Guy did.

Steve seemed only slightly more amused.

When I pushed myself off the counter and into his arms, it seemed to take little to no effort for him to both balance my weight that was wrapped around his chest, and secure one of his arms around the back of me.

"Let's go take a shower," I suggested to the specimen.

He actually frowned at me. All while he snaked a hand perilously close to the back pockets of my pants. "I've had more sponge baths over the past few days than during my entire life. I'm clean enough."

Somehow I wasn't shocked. I just had to salute the hospital employees that managed to swing that feat for God and Country.

But I leaned forward and rested my elbows on his broad shoulders. With a straight face I managed to tell him, "Steve…we're not going in the shower to get clean."


End file.
